Art

XU BEIHONG

Xu Beihong (1895 – 1953) was born in Yixing, China. Known for his Chinese ink paintings of horses and birds. He travelled to Shanghai, Paris, and other cities in Western Europe, where he learnt to imitate Western art techniques.

MUCHA

Alfons Maria Mucha  (1860 – 1939),  was a Czech artist, known best for his paintings, advertisements, illustrations, postcards, and designs.  He moved to Paris where he developed the Art Nouveau style.  After being arrested by the Gestapo, he became ill with pneumonia during his interrogation and died in Prague of a lung infection.

MACKINTOSH

Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868 – 1928) was a Scottish architect, designer and artist, being the main representative of Art Nouveau in the UK.  Mackintosh’s work interior design and textiles combined his own designs with those of Margaret MacDonald, his wife, whose floral style complemented the more formal, rectilinear work of Mackintosh.  They later moved to the South of France, where he concentrated on watercolour painting.

KATSUSHIKA HOKUSAI

Katsushika Hokusai (1760 – 1849) was a Japanese artist influenced by  styles of Chinese painting.  His series ‘Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji’ include his best know work ‘The Great Wave of Kanagawa’, which still  receives recognition to this day all over the world.  His work covered a wide range of subjects including landscapes and images of everyday life of Japanese people from all social levels. Hokusai was a member of the Nichiren sect of Buddhism. His work influenced the Art Nouveau and Impressionism movements.

VAN GOGH

Dutch post-impressionist painter who enormously influenced expressionism, fauvism and abstract art.  After moving to Paris, Van Gogh discovered the French Impressionists and he began to collect Japanese ukiyo-e woodblock prints, which significantly influenced his style. After moving to the south of France, his work became brighter in colour, as he was impressed by the strong sunlight of this part of the world. Over there, he developed his famous and unique style.

WILLIAM HOLMAN HUNT

William Holman Hunt was an English painter and one of the founders of the  Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, an art group influenced by romanticism.  They were the first avant-garde movement in art.  He became famous for his religious paintings, such as “The Light of the World” and “The Finding of the Saviour in the Temple“, in which he depicted Jesus, Mary, Joseph and the contrasting reactions of the rabbis to Jesus’ discourse.  For the making of the picture, Hunt travelled to the Middle East and used local models.  His attention to detail is particularly evident in this painting, as he studied different aspects of Ancient Judaism to take into account Biblical symbolism.