"Calla Lilies with Red Anemone" by O'Keeffe

I like Georgia O'Keeffe, although I do think she is a little bit overrated. She was the key of the early-20th-century Santa Fe School, one that is largely unknown except for her. I can really only appreciate her flowers, and don't much care for the bones and whatnot.

"Repose" by Alexander

John White Alexander is a very undervalued artist. He has a very distinct, swishy style, a little bit Impressionistic, like Sargent. He liked to do paintings that were dominated by a specific color or aspect of the subject, like how here the painting is defined by the wide sweep of the woman's white skirt. Another comparison to Sargent - this painting is very much like JSS's own "Repose," with the woman wearing a big pale skirt, passed out on the couch.

"Knives" by Warhol

Hm. Andy Warhol. I'm not a big fan of Pop Art. But some of his work really sticks out for me - his cat series, for example, or this painting! There's just something about the simple knives and stark pink-and-black that, for me, has a quality of elegance totally lacking in most other art of the era. Seeing art with no elegance, well, it cuts me like a knife!

"Princess Tatyana Alexandrovna Yusupova" by Winterhalter

Franz Xavier Winterhalter was a German painter who is famous for his exquisite portraits of important people of the mid-19th century, especially queens. They included several of Queen Victoria, Empress Elisabeth of Austria, Empress Eugenie of the Second Empire in France, and various others. This is a painting of a Russian princess, which would have made her a minor member of the Imperial Family (in Russia, children of the Czar are called Grand Dukes/Duchesses, and so Prince/Princess is a lesser title). This painting is similar to many of his others, but I liked it particularly well because it has a more subtle, luminous quality that others. And also, I love pearl crowns and necklaces like hers!

"The Triumph of Venus" by Boucher

Rococo is the frothy, frivolous, and largely superficial artistic era that encompassed the mid-18th century in Europe, predominantly France. Francois Boucher was le bon ton of the French art world, and was admired by King Louis XV and even more by his famous mistress of 19 years, Madame de Pompadour - he painted her portrait several times. This painting is one of his finest. Rococo French paintings are not among my noted favorites - I see it as being largely a decline in the quality of French art. Even though obviously incredible skill went into the creation of this painting, it's the fault of Rococo and its unrealistic cherubic faces that we have no idea what Marie Antoinette looked like!

"Arab Purchasing a Bridle" by Gerome

Gerome was a leading artist from the 19th century Oriental movement in art, which favored scenes from Arabia. He painted many scenes of harems and men in turbans. I liked this painting in particular because of how luminous the white horse looks in contrast to the dark background. It's also a little quieter and more chaste than his other works, most of which feature detailed settings and at least one naked lady. But that's the thing about Orientalism!

"Canoe in the Rapids" by Homer

Winslow Homer is one of my favorite American painters, and I think his watercolors are even better than Sargent's (high praise coming from me). No one can paint water like him! I like this painting because there's a certain charm about what I think is a father and son, out alone in their canoe among the sloshing rapids. Homer used watercolors to create water and colors, and used blank space to great advantage.

"Mrs. Ezekiel Goldthwait" by Copley

John Singleton Copley was an American (colonial) painter who was also popular and well-known in Georgian England. He did portraits of: the famous American revolutionaries John Hancock, Samuel Adams, and Paul Revere; the British military commander Thomas Gage (painted pre-Revolution); and the three youngest daughters of George III. This painting is just the wife of a well-to-do American gentleman, Mrs. Ezekiel Goldthwait. Copley is one of the British/American painters who stood out as the few realistic painters of the 18th century, in comparison to superficial, Rococo France.

"Wheat Field with Rising Sun" by Van Gogh

I love Van Gogh. Who doesn't love Van Gogh? Crazy people, that's who. This is one of his many field paintings, and this stood out for me because the sunset-scheme is different from the rest. The yellow of the setting sun is reflected in the wheat, as is the purple color of the mountains. And because of his characteristic unevenness and strange perspective, the landscape has a wild quality you wouldn't usually find in such a pastoral scene or regular landscape.

"Time Transfixed" by Magritte

I'm not a really big fan of the Surrealists (I cannot STAND Dali), but Magritte is the one exception. I love his work, and this is one of my favorites. I think it stands out because or its impeccable reality - aside from the fact that there's a train coming out the back of a fireplace. The perspective and details are both rendered with perfection. And look at the lovely smoke!

"Mrs. Walter Rathbone Bacon" by Zorn

This is a lovely portrait of a railroad president's wife by Anders Zorn, a wonderful painter who unfortunately is almost totally eclipsed by his friend and contemporary John Singer Sargent, who had a very similar style. They both did many elongated portraits that had loose brushstrokes evoking Impressionism. Sargent, and their other friend James McNeill Whistler, are said to have both complimented this painting, which now hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. And look at the cute dog!

"Madonna and Child" by Bellini

This is a painting by Giovanni Bellini of the classic Christian pose. I like this painting because even though, as per usual, the baby Jesus looks like he's an alien from another planet, there is a quiet grace and beauty in the Madonna's face, like all Renaissance masterpieces, but I though there was something special in hers.