Madonna and Child with the Infant Saint John the Baptist and Angels
Cornelis van Cleve
ca. 1550
European art
Oil on panel
Cornelis van Cleve’s painting focuses all attention on the Virgin and Child, highlighting them as holy icons. Seated at center, they preside over a balanced ensemble of graceful figures whose bowed heads, circling movements, and arm gestures direct our eyes back to the divine pair. Van Cleve pushed their solid, rounded bodies forward, further stressing their importance. Even the space they occupy is designed to pull us toward them. Ordered according to the Renaissance construct of one-point perspective, space recedes to a single vanishing point that converges on the central figures. Just follow the lines of the floor tiles into the distance (see image). Your eyes will always land on the Virgin’s tender face.
Saint Sebastian
Nicolas Régnier
ca. 1620
European art
Oil on canvas
71.558
The eyes have it in these two paintings of Saint Sebastian, an early Christian martyr. Sebastian served as a captain in the Imperial Roman army, but when he refused to give up his faith, his soldiers shot him with arrows. Nicolas Régnier portrayed the story’s grisly climax (at left), showing the bound Sebastian pierced by arrows, while Anthony van Dyck chose an earlier moment when Sebastian’s men prepared him for execution. In one, Sebastian’s eyes look heavenward for deliverance; in the other, the saint looks directly at us while confronting his fate. Both artists dramatized the scene by emphasizing the saint’s eyes, but which gaze speaks more powerfully to you?
The Neophyte (First Experience of the Monastery)
Gustave Doré
ca. 1866-1868
European art
Oil on canvas
71.2061
New to the monastery, a young man gazes woefully at the viewer. He clearly regrets his vows. Anxious images like this one were a staple of Romantic art, and Gustave Doré was a master of the genre. He took his subject from George Sand’s contemporary novel Sipiridion, in which a young novice, Brother Angel, bemoans his isolation behind the cloister wall. Doré heightens the youth’s desolation by contrasting his tense posture and youthfulness with the row of bent and decrepit old men. Doré himself noted the grim humor of the young man’s predicament and quipped, “He will be over the wall tonight.”
Young Girl with her Dog
Narcisse Virgile Diaz de la Peña
ca. 1850
Oil on paper, transferred to canvas
European art
71.640
Look at the young girl’s eyes. They are all but lost in shadow, suggesting that she is deep in reverie. Indeed, this entire picture is a kind of dreamscape—its leafy, sun-dappled garden set with broadly brushed pink and white blooms. The ethereal theme is a perfect subject for a picture like this one, which was designed solely to display its own beauty. Such poetic images fulfilled the Romantic desire for art that offered refuge from the harshness of the world.
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