Best Paintings of all time

John Singer Sargent's (1856-1925) 'El Jaleo' is an almost 12 feet wide loosely desaturated painting with a fantastic composition and a great sense of movement not very common in other Sargent's works. It's like if the dancer is about to do one of those energetic flamenco dancing moves. The absence of a barrier between the viewer and the dancer makes for an illusion that we are present at the event. The lightning effect helps to create this sensation, as if the viewer is somehow the source of the light that illuminates all the painting. It's somehow reminiscent of the "stage ballerina's" of Degas which Sargent probably admired and it's definitely a favorite of mine.

Best Paintings of all time

The painting 'Applicants for Admission to a Casual Ward', by Sir Luke Fildes (1843-1927) is a very interesting painting to me for many reasons. The use of the light projected to the building enhancing the bunch of poor people leaning against it, is quite good. And if you pay close attention, you'll see that the painting depicts homeless people from different social classes in a row waiting for something, probably shelter for the night. It was painted by a victorian painter in 1874, but it totally reminds me of a scene from the Great Depression from 1929. To think that it was originally created as a print in some magazine, and intended only to gain sympathy and to create a feeling of social conscience from the readers, speaks volumes of the skills of the painter.

His other painting that I put here is a very touching painting named 'The Widower' that depicts a father's desperation facing the challenges of being extremely poor and a widower at the same time. He is crying holding one of his five children who is aparently very sick. The oldest daughter seems to be thinking, to no avail, in a way she can help her father. The whole dramatic scene is enhanced by all the little details like the very poor house, the grimy and old clothes of the father, and one of the children seems to be starving and trying to find food in his empty bowl. No one can deny that it's a very emotional and heartbreaking painting.

Best Paintings of all time

Carl Lemoch or Kirill Vikentevich Lemokh (1841-1910), a realist russian painter, painted this work that I consider a favorite of mine, for no other reason than what it represents. A very endearing woman (presumably not the mother) is presenting this adorable little girl to the newborn sibling, while the rest of the "flock" awaits for their turn to see it. The cute girl is a little shy and confuse and is grabbing the woman's dress trying to hide from what she's seeing like kids normally reacts in such a situation. The poor house and family, the resting mother in the back, the lovely woman and the innocent look in the toddlers eyes, all adds to this beautiful painting named 'New acquaintance'.

 The next one is a work by the almost unknown german painter Ludwing Seitz (1844–1908). While in the Vatican, there are a lot more things to see there than the Sistine Chapel. The hallways of the Museum is known for being filled all around with beautiful paintings and it never fails to impress the visitors. This particular fresco by Seitz, one of the few he painted there, is my favorite. The angel seems like 3d painted.

Copies of Famous Paintings

It is a well known fact that Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) was very influenced by Michelangelo (1475-1564) since his trip to Italy in his youth. It helped define his style of very muscular figures, but on the average, Rubens was a little better with body proportions, and his paintings of women are a lot softer and curvy, if not a little fat, in comparison to the big muscled and hard looking bodies of Michelangelo's women. Both were geniuses of course, and it was much easier for Rubens to learn studying paintings of masters like Michelangelo whereas Michelangelo pretty much didn't have anyone before him painting muscular bodies for him to study. Rubens study of 'The Creation of Adam' originally by Michelangelo, is great for us to see the similarities and differences of these two masters. The even more muscular body of God and the fiercer look in his eyes in Rubens copy is a nice detail to notice. So here it is, the original and the copy respectively.

Copies of Famous Paintings

Sometimes it's not forgery, but just a study of a famous painting done by another artist. I like those, specially when it's a famous painter "copying" another one. My first example here is Géricault's 'The Raft of the Medusa' that was painted by Victor Meirelles, who even though isn't as famous, at least it is one of the most respected brazilian painters ever. So here it is to compare, the original from Géricault and then the copy by Meirelles.

Copies of Famous Paintings

For some weird reason, I have always liked art forgery. I mean, not that I approve, of course, so let me explain myself. What I like is to see the skills of the forger, which, like it or not, needs to be tremendous to deceive everyone. To copy a style is great, but what impresses me the most is to see copies of already existing paintings. Tony Tetro is an art forger who taught himself how to paint from books and he is really good at it. His story is the classical biography of forgers. He became rich with "his" works, then got arrested, lost his money and after release, now he makes legal copies for private clients. Compare his work here, with the original, and see how talented he is. It's a copy of a work by Caravaggio named 'Saint John the Baptist in the Wilderness'. First the original and then the copy.

Best Paintings of all Time

This next painting isn't about a famous painter, or great skills, and it doesn't even represent a particular painting style. I added because of what it depicts. In this case, 103 of the most famous figures throughout history. A subtle analysis from the title of the painting might suggest that they all might be in hell, which is a little creepy considering that some are still alive. Besides that, not much else needs to be said, only admired.  And here it is, 'Discussing the Divine Comedy with Dante' by Dai Dudu, Li Tiezi, and Zhang An.

A painting that might be considered a "crazy" adition to my favorites list is Lucian Freud's  'Benefits Supervisor Sleeping'. In this fantastic work you can see all kinds of different skin tones that a naked body possesses. It makes for a much more organic look in my opinion, and much better than all those sleeping Venus with their smooth unblemished skins. Besides, I think that the lady he painted was having bad dreams which is something we can relate much easier in place of the bored spoiled Venus's.

The thing with Lucian Freud's portraits are that they are like an excruciating exercise of capturing the truthful essence of what he is depicting. No photograph or even an enhanced by photoshop picture can replicate this honesty. That's how good he was. He didn't just capture the surface, but all the many layers of his subject, be it physically or emotionally.

It was not something new for Egon Schielle already had done that decades earlier, but that doesn't take anything away from Lucian in my opinion.

Best Paintings of all Time

Herbert James Draper's (1863-1920) painting of 'The Lament for Icarus' is a really beautiful piece of art. Nice details like Icarus very tanned skin for someone who was flying under the sun for quite some time as the myth says, in contrast of the very pale fair skin of the nymphs, only adds to the appeal of the painting. Even being different from the original myth where his wings were partially made of wax and should be melted by then, doesn't diminish much from this powerful painting. I particularly like the huge wings, because I think it kind of make it believable to think that with the right engineering those wings could work. I also love the fact that the wings are based on the bird-of-paradise pattern.

 'The Empire of Lights' series of paintings by René Magritte (1898-1967) are very ordinary if you look for the techniques employed. At the same time though, it's this lack of artistic depth that makes them for fantastic surrealist paintings. All the three of them are very dark nocturnal scenes settled against a bright blue sky with fluffy clouds. Magritte is a genius because of this in my opinion. He doesn't need fantastical elements to make surrealism, just a subtle paradoxical combination of day and night. He deconstructs fundamental organizing laws of nature, but at the same time he doesn't, for a scene like that is very plausible under the right circumstances. Still it's pretty ingenious to make sunlight, the source of clarity, to be the element who causes the unease feeling normally associated with darkness. The luminosity becomes disturbing by making the darkness below even more
indecipherable and therefore scarier than it would normally seem. I chose only two of those paintings, because it exemplifies better my description here.

Best Paintings of all Time

Actor and writer Peter Ustinov said that "If Botticelli were alive now, he would be working for Vogue", but I say that if it's true, then Giovanni Boldini (1842-1931) would be working for Elle or Cosmopolitan, or something like that. The "Master of Swish", as he was called because of his flowing style of painting, Boldini created a particular style that I'm pretty sure was a precursor for fashion designer sketches that sprung in the 20th century. Not that I'm into fashion, but these two paintings of him were beautifully executed and I really like them. Here they are: 'Ritratto di Martha Regnier' and 'Portrait of Mrs. Howard Johnston', respectively.

Best Paintings of all Time

For the same reasons that I added the other Sir Joseph Noel Patton paintings, i'm adding this one, "The Reconciliation of Titania and Oberon". It's a very busy, but in a good way, with a fascinating composition.

Alfons Mucha (1860-1939) was not much different than Patton when it came to make a busy paintings with fantastic characters and a psychodelic atmosphere in composition. The difference being that he did most of his work in the then more sophisticated and elegant style of Art Nouveau. Here's one my favorites: 'The Slav Epic'.

Best Paintings of all Time

A painter which I learned about recently is Gyula Benczúr (1844–1920), a realist hungarian painter who was nearly forgotten, but thanks to the internet is now praised as he should. With a style who closely resembles some paintings of Rubens or Rembrandt in the use of the light or in composition, some of his paintings are my favorites now. So here it is, “Recapture of the Buda Castle in 1686” and “Baptism of Vajk, respectively

Jan Matejko's (1838-1893) 'Battle of Grunwald' may be considered a mess by some, but it's a mess that I can't take my eyes of.

Best Paintings of all Time

Joseph Noel Paton's (1821-1901) 'The Fairy Raid: Carrying Off a Changeling, Midsummer Eve' is  another painting of this great master of the Pre-Raphaelite style that is a favorite of mine and for sure not the last. I definitely love paintings with lots of well executed little details like this one.

 Giovanni Paolo Panini (1691-1765) wasn't one of the best painters of his time but this particular painting using in all it's glory the unreal embellishment characteristic of capriccio, made the painting named Ancient Rome quite interesting to watch, seeing so many elements in fantastical combinations.

Best Paintings of all Time

Adolph Menzel's (1815-1905) 'The Iron-Rolling Mill' was his most famous painting and with justice, for it is a powerful painting that depicts like none before the brutal conditions of the industrial  labour of the nineteenth century. Menzel made the human element much more important than the industrial work surrounding and with that he achieved a very special work of art.

Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) is a very special painter to me. He was a master of neoclassicism, realism, symbolism and pretty much every other kind of art he ever tried. His use of golden color is fantastic. I chose this one in particular because it's a painting that has most of the elements by which Klimt's paintings were famous. The painting was named 'Beethoven Frieze', not coincidentally the same name of this very blog, of course.

Best Paintings of all Time

Some of my favorites are not because of the beauty of the paintings but because of the theme, usually one that has never been painted before. Cornelis Cornelisz Van Haarlem's (1562-1638) Fall of the Titans is one of those paintings. The composition is very unusual in a good way.

Same thing happens here in brazilian painter's Vitor Meirelles (1832-1903) most famous work 'First Mass' with it's rich details.

Best Paintings of all Time

I never cared much about Cubism. But when studying the dynamic Futurism that came differing from the quiet and static Cubism it made me appreciate what I believe was the shocking initial intention of the very same Cubism. Umberto Boccioni (1882-1916) is in my opinion the most gifted cubist/futurist painter ever. His paintings 'Elasticity' and 'Materia' are particularly my favorites.

Best Paintings of all Time

Hieronymus Bosch's (1450-1516) The Garden of Earthly Delights is one of these paintings that it couldn't be left out of any list of best paintings. The fantastic details in both context or skills of the painter are everywhere.

Vincent Van Gogh's (1853-1890) Starry Night Over the Rhone is another favorite. The thing with Van Gogh is that in spite fo his excessive use of bright colors, his paintings were mostly sad. Beautiful but sad expressionist paintings. This one in particular has a kind of a nostalgic feel like a Shakespeare sad monologue.

Best Paintings of all Time

In this beautiful fresco of Sant'Ignazio Church in Rome, Andrea Pozzo (1642-1709) uses the illusionistic technique called quadratura to create a fantastic piece of art who looks like a 3d painting.

The theme of 'Jesus among the doctors' has never before been so well painted like in this one by José de Ribera (1591-1652), simply because it's probably one of earliest and only paintings where Jesus as a boy was not painted either blonde or very ugly, or both. Besides, I love baroque and tenebrism, and Ribera was simply a master of both, controling the contrasts of light and dark like very few could.

Best Paintings of all Time

Salvador Dali's (1904-1989) The Temptation of St. Anthony is an exercise of imagination of a fantastic mind that only a genius of Dali's caliber could deliver. I love it.

Francisco Goya's (1746-1828) El Coloso gave me nightmares when I a child. All the people running from the threatening giant was scary as hell for a kid to see. Goya, a master of scary paintings obviously would be the author of this masterpiece.

Best Paintings of all Time

Diego Rivera's (1886-1957) Man at the Crossroads was an instant classic the moment Rivera decided to add to the to the huge fresco the controversial Lenin portrait in a painting who would reside inside the Rockefeller Center which is something like a capitalism temple. The painting was destroyed becoming immortalized in the process and since it's recreation by the badass Rivera in Mexico it became an instant success.

Rosa Bonheur's (1822-1899) The Horse Fair is one beautiful painting. The light, the composition, everything works fine there and it's in my opinion the best and most realistic horses ever painted.

Another one of Lucian Freud that is a favorite of mine is Two Irishmen in W11. Just look at the details of the hands of the older man. It's fabulous.

Best Paintings of all Time

Altdorfer's (1480-1538) Battle of Issus is another great painting. It's probably one of the very few paintings ever to depict an entire war in just one panel.

Paolo Uccello's (1397-1475) The Counterattack of Michelotto da Cotignola at the Battle of San Romano is damaged by time, but still a very beautiful painting with great composition, and has inspired many other paintings through the ages.

Gustaf Wappers (1803-1874) ‘Episodes from September Days 1830 on the Place de l’Hôtel de Ville in Brussels’ is another great painting probably created inspired by Delacroix and Géricault’s more famous paintings. I still love it anyway.

Best Paintings of all Time

Rembrandt's (1606-1669) Nightwatch (1640-1642) is another favorite of mine. It had different  interpretations through the times and it has been a constant presence in best painting lists.

Different interpretations is something that Poussin's (1594-1665) The Shepherds of Arcadia has been submited through the ages perharps more than any other painting except for Da Vinci's paintings. I just love all this mystery.

Tintoretto's (1518-1594) Crucifixion is also a tremendous panel that is one of my favorites. A master at depicting muscular figures, Tintoretto delivered his best in this one.

Best Paintings of all Time

The powerful painting of Pieter Bruegel, the Elder (1525-1569) about The Tower of Babel. In Bruegel's painting it was a roman to medieval european view of a gigantic tower and very different from the real one, but still very impressive.

Rafael Sanzio's (1483-1520) School of Athens is another well known painting that I added to my list. It depicts a fantastic encounter of the most brilliant minds of ancient Greece, and with the great renaissance masters such as Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Rafael himself used as the models. I think it can't get any better than that.

And Jan Van Eyck's Ghent Altarpiece who did here something very special. His incredible details of the expressions, beautiful faces (especially the females), mastery in using lightning effects on different kinds of material like gold, glass, fabrics and others makes this a masterpiece. Painting like that in the early 15th century was completely unexpected. In some aspects he was centuries ahead of his fellow painters with techniques that looked like 3D. And I can't stop thinking that there's some hidden message in the detail of Mary Magdalene with a younger lady by her side in the inner right-hand panel.

Best Paintings of all Time

It would never be a list of the best paintings of all time without Michelangelo (1475-1564). So here it is. Not much need to be said about it, just admired.

The Sistine Chapel ceiling (1508-1512)

 And The Last Judgment (1536-1541)