Francois Boucher (1703 —1770) is one of the most typical Rococo painter, engraver, and designer. Most of his hundreds of works are decorative paintings and illustrations. He creates his paintings in a meticulous and carefree way so that becomes a most fashionable painter. His sentimental and simple style is widely followed and therefore makes a great contribution to the improvement of Neoclassicism. The works of Boucher are considered as the perfect expression of French taste in the Rococo period.

Boucher makes great artistic achievements in ceiling paintings, decorative frescoes, portraits and landscapes of pastoral style. Boucher is a controversial painter in the history of Western art. His famous paintings include Birth of Venus, Diana Getting out of Her Bath, An Autumn Pastoral and so on. Among these paintings, Diana Getting out Of Her Bath catches more attention.

Diana is ancient Greek moon goddess. Boucher makes this painting his best work through its skillful artistic techniques and aesthetic taste of depicting strong powder temperament, which receives a great popularity from the aristocracy. The painting depicts Diana just finished bathing sitting on the hillside after she returned from hunting. There is an arrow pot and preys hunted lying on the grass and hounds is drinking water. The maid bent to the ground and her eyes concentrate on Diana’s tilted right leg and toes. They seem to be searching for something. The feminine body is exquisitely depicted in bright colors and delicate brush strokes so that brings the mythical goddess into the scope of aesthetic worldly enjoyments.

His paintings on the subject of nude women in mythology, shows the declining aristocracy pursuing for a life of debauchery. The nobles ask for the paintings to be made as sweet as possible and full of sensual temptation. The nude goddess he painted looks as if pinched from rosy clay, without sense of reality. The paintings that can best represent his style are those mythological story painting used for decorating palace, such as Diana Getting out Of Her Bath. These works are in gorgeous colors which show his imagination and talent in decoration. Boucher is also interested in collecting Oriental arts and crafts.

The Bay of Marseilles, view from L’Estaque is the representative work of the great post-Impressionist Paul Cezanne.
a bay with strong thick blocks of color. A variety of blue stretches from one side of the canvas to the other end, establishing meticulous and syncretic strokes.

Behind the bay is a row of undulating hills. Above the hills is the blue sky, which is added a very pale rose red strokes, just like a faint afterglow from the sunset. Cezanne cuts off space at the edge of the painting. The blue color of the bay is much more impressive than the prospect colors of brown and red so that the space becomes ambiguous and similar. We must take it as a panorama painting in depth as well as again color permutations on the surface of the painting.

The Bay of Marseilles, view from L’Estaque, unlike paintings of the Renaissance or Baroque style, its space retreats into an infinitely far-reaching perspective. The buildings in the front view gather together and close proximity to the audience. These buildings are simplified into cubes and the color on the side is bright. The buildings and the trees behind the house are in yellow, orange, red, and green. Even they become smaller, they seem to be of the same clarity as the bigger one.

Though we can clearly tell what the house, roof, chimney and trees are, it is hard to imagine that they exists in the real life. If we are looking for the space and the air around the house and chimney we will find that empty space does not exist at all. The trees on the right sight of the house should be a little farther. In fact, the tree is next to the house in mottled colors. Cezanne wants to recreate the nature by colors. He believes that the sketch is the result of using color properly.

Although Paul Cezanne has struggled, hesitant and dissatisfied time to time, he definitely achieves great success through this painting. Cezanne is possible to establish a new concept of painting o and has a great impact on the 20th century painting for over 60 years lies in his proper use of the color and instant phantom of impressionist as well as his strong and sensitive perception on observing nature.

Among the impressionists, Manet was regarded as the greatest still life painter, especially about flowers. There were two main periods when he painted flowers, namely the medium-term of 1860s and his last time. Because of his serious illness, he was unable to draw large pictures. And then he turned to paint still life, which was easy for him to find prototype. His interest in painting flowers produced during learning at the museum, but he went to the museum aiming to explore the ancient painters’ secrets. During his travel to wife’s hometown—Holland, he studied very delicate works representing flowers, fruits and precious tableware made by Flemish painters. These things were put in a white tablecloth or carpet, reminding people of the feast and dishes related to the western churches. As defined by the tradition, still life was never reduced to simply imitate the real things, and always implied the philosophy or religion. A lot of Holland paintings appeared fully mature flowers and fruits which collapsed

were sure for death. The dark background chosen by the painter made the delicacy of white outline hazy and pink petals foil. The painting was made with a brush dipped in paint with more concentrated pigment and texture. The green leaves around the flowers enriched the auxiliary color points, fixing the theme of flowers on the upper left corner of the painting. These flowers in plenty of strokes were what the painter devoted to the writer and art critic Champfleury who was naturalism pioneer, one of his friends, and a close friend of Courbet, to express his respect for the conducive struggle for modern painting.

Woman with a black tie was created in 1917 by Amedeo Modigliani. It was said that the portrait prototype was his first woman, a female journalist, Beatriz Hastings. Some biographies wrote that, this was a legendary woman who could tame the arrogant artist as a docile dog. But, unfortunately, Amedeo Modigliani was addicted to some pernicious habits like alcoholism and drug taking. Their little daughter died when she was born. Finally, this legendary woman left him too.

The portrait Modigliani depicted had a unified modeling mode: mask-like face, almond eyes without eyeballs, triangle nose and small mouth and the arc-shaped eyebows.

These were all configured in the slant head. The simplistic oval face, elongated neck and skinny shoulders were sketched out by clear lines. The elongated head and slant posture were slightly skew off the center line in the composition, and sometimes in order to achieve balance, the two eyes were painted in different sizes and shapes. But the most amazing was that: the paint just used the simplistic and patterned model presented different characters and different traits vividly and at the same time conveyed the sentimental mood of him.

The picture of the painting is a woman wearing a white shirt with a black tie, she looks very mysterious and strange, embodies the unique and graceful charm of woman. This should be a willful and rakish woman, but the facial expression indicates that she is not happy. She looks a little melancholy, her eyes are very empty, her mind is low, and this paint should be the real reflection of the author’s inner world.

The Kiss (In German: Der Kuss) was one of the representative works of Gustav Klimt, who was the world famous Symbolist painter. It was painted during his “Golden Period” and became very successful. After then, he painted a series of paintings in a similar gilded style.

The Kiss was a square painting, showing us a couple embracing, together. We can see that their bodies entwined in robes. This expression style was influenced by the Art Nouveau of the contemporary Gustav Klimt covered gold foil on classical paintings highlighting the modern look of the work. The painting was a typical Symbolic work and it was the most popular work painted by Klimt at the same time.

When Klimt painted this panting he was in love with Emilie. The man in the painting lovingly holding the woman’s head gave him a big kiss. And the head of the woman turned to one side because of the big kiss. Let’s have a closer look, the woman was feeling the kiss with her eyes closed, without noticing her neck has been distorted. The bodies of two people embracing and kissing together and became one. It is hard to tell boundaries between them, as if fusing into a golden light. They were genuflecting on a colorful flowerbed, just like a altarpiece that admired love. The Kiss was undoubtedly the most beautiful works of interpenetrating the love.

The figures in The Kiss were thought to be Gustav Klimt and Emilie Flöge, but there was no evidence or record about it. Because the woman in this painting was quite similar to the female in the Woman with hat and feather boa, Goldfish and Danaë, so some people thought that the woman in the picture may be “red Hilda.

Some considered this painting a symbol of the strong lust. The woman in the painting nestled in the bosom of the man with her face and lips close to the man, ignoring the environment around, was a hint of sex. However, this revealed a warm, romantic and passionate life impulse instead of provocative and vulgar feeling against the golden color. Just as the Klimt advocates said: “No one has ever created such a tall and beautiful women portrait as Klimt” Variety of gold and silver, copper, and coral decoration improved the charm of this painting greatly. It was more than a painting but a delicate crafts.

Saint Lazare Station which was painted in 1877 by Monet who is one of the most important painters in France is a depiction of Paris’s train station, showing an actual impression of daily life scene. Monet has been longing for the effect that the light goes through and evaporates the glass ceiling and the shape of automobiles and carriages from the chaos. Monet firmly believes that the magic effect of light and air is the most important thing. He cleverly balances the tones and colors in the painting which outstandingly performs the power, space, contrast and movement.

In 1883, Claude Monet settled in Virginie and built a small garden there for painting. He planted a lot of lotus in the pool, which made him find the themes to achieve his goal: to draw some hard bodies, water and air and try to make them gather together. The painting showed Monet’s desire of complex blending without sad mood. Each person studying Monet’s creative activities development will find if the initial fate contributed to the development trend of Monet, so then he created his fate later. The reason why Monet becomes the founder of impressionism style and is recognized “first class” by his friends is due to his unshakable and strong will. As is known to all, impressionism means the revolution of feeling and observation ways, which not only has changed painting, sculpture, music, and the literature. As of today, it still has not lost its important influence and has been changing us.

In the work Boy In A Red Vest, the boy’s image fills the whole painting. His arched body constitutes a major whole composition. This image is firmly located in a compact space structure –the left is limited by the curtain lines, the top is framed by the horizontal lines on the wall and the right is limited by the deep colors of the triangle. The curved arms and curved body are coordinated. The whole painting’s shape, color, point, line and other factors are made according to the rational order some. In order to obtain the safety and harmony of the painting’s structure, the painter deliberately changes the image and proportion of objects.
color block arrangement have great originality. Even the child’s forehead’s white flash is not casually created; that piece of square paper under the juvenile’s left elbow plays a decisive role in the painting. If we will block it, the painting will lose balance and luster.

Paul Cezanne once took an Italian youth named Lucid Michelangelo as a model and made different oil portraits from four angles. And this painting takes three fourths sides, which is one of the most successful and most famous pieces. In this painting, the character’s head leans on the bending of the left arm, and right arm is free to hang on the legs. Such posture is quite similar to the human postures in German painter Durer’s print Melancholy. Perhaps, this posture itself is with some sad means. This posture has appeared in Cezanne’s later other portraits, such as Smoking Man, Italian Girl, etc.

Only to see Claude Monet in Giverny can you know who he is, his personality, his interest in life and his inner world,” His friend and biographer, Gustav wrote. Monet’s family moved to Giverny in 1883, which was a village between Paris and Rouen. He then set about building a garden. For this garden, he himself commented: “This is my best work.” This place was his final shelter where he lived for 43 years.

Water Lilies is a series of oil paintings with a number of about 250. Most of them were completed when Monet was in Giverny garden. The paintings depicted Monet’s flower garden in different scenes. It is hard to believe that when many of the works were painted Claude Monet was suffering from cataracts. In his garden, he made different attempts to arrange the light effect. Therefore, Water Lilies series appeared in a various postures.

The paintings Water Lilies, in the contrast of the colors of the bright yellow, orange and vermilion, were like a mass of burning fire. The strong whirlwind-like strokes strengthened the effect of the flame distortedly rising among the lily clouds, showing a visual world of dream. Here, there was no water lily but a dark round plate, which highlighted by bright strokes. There was no mark of space but light and color captured by the brush.

The oil paintings were shown at museums although the world. During the 1920s, France set about building two oval rooms for eight water lily murals by Claude Monet. And people got the chance to
on many of the following generations of artists.

Claude Monet created the world-famous Impression Sunrise. This painting delineated a scene that the sun rising through the mist at the harbor of Le Havre. The loose brush strokes depicted a picture in the mist in the morning, a variety of colors made the water brilliant. Those boats above the water could be seen clearly. It was the visual scene that the painter enjoyed when the sun rising with light and colors in harbor city of France.

From this painting, we might think that the sun was the focus of the light as the brightest point in the painting. However, we would find it not accurately right because the sky was as bright as the sun if we looked at this painting more carefully. Let’s imagine if we make a black and white copy of Impression: Sunrise, we will be surprised to seen that the sun is almost gone. Yes, it is disappeared. And what have happened? To explain this phenomenon in a professional way is that “the older part of the visual cortex in the brain registers only luminance and not color, so that the sun in the painting would be invisible to it.”

This painting broke the bondage of traditional painting, a critic quoted from the title of this painting to ridicule the young innovative painters that Claude Monet represented as Impressionism, This school of painting derived its name from it. And this painting was shown in the first joint exhibition of Impressionist artists in 1874, becoming the most typical works of Monet. The name impressionist also had its story. Shortly after the exhibition of 1874, a critic whose name was Louis Leroy posted a review in the newspaper with the title of “The Exhibition of the Impressionists”.

In the mind of Monet, landscape was nothing but an instantaneous impression. He just painted what he had seen from his window in Le Havre: the sun in the mist and some boats floating on the sea. He searched a proper title for this picture, and then he found it. He made Impression as the title but not Le Havre. Impression was telling people that we have some impression in it when we are impressed through its free and ease techniques.

The Mona Lisa is undoubtedly the most famous, researched, debated and talked about painting of all time. It is a half-length portrait of a woman painted in three poplar boards. The creator of painting Leonardo da Vinci also remains an amazing person, his genius on art and science is perhaps beyond other figures in his time.

For years, questions and debates on Mona Lisa never ends. Who is this woman? Although some evidence proved that the woman was Lisa Gherardini, new gossips and reports came out continually. The identification of the woman has kept scholars busy for centuries.

However the main reason that makes the Mona Lisa so precious and famous is the painting itself. Leonardo used his new experiment esfumato technique to place the woman simply and calmly in the space of the painting. Leonardo softened all sharp outlines to give the illusion of depth or three-dimensionality. The woman is portrayed seated in what appears to be an open loggia with dark pillar bases on either side. When looking at Mona Lisa from the left side, she looks taller than from the right. Also the Mona Lisa’s smile is mysterious. Is she happy or sad?

Mona Lisa has no clearly visible eyebrows. In 2007, researchers announced that Mona Lisa was originally painted with eyebrows, but they had gradually disappeared due to passed times and overcleaning.

From the day it came out, the Mona Lisa has created mystery and questions which is exactly a great artwork should be. This everlasting masterpiece is still breathtaking in the Musee du Louvre.