"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.