Monalisa, Guernica, The starry night, and many more. All these paintings are the epitome of greatness in art history and so are the famous painters who had created these masterpieces with heart and soul. Here is a list of history’s 15 famous painters (In no particular order).
Be it the artistic walls of ancient caves or the modern-day museums, the magic of painting has lived across time. The entrancing world of art has survived wars, disasters, and whatnot. History has practically lived through these art pieces, without aging even a bit. The first-ever painting to delight our eyes was made about 40,000 years ago! Therefore, it wouldn’t be a mistake to call the world of painting, one of the oldest surviving things on the planet.
The major reason why art stands out is the connection it is able to make with our body, soul and mind. It makes the world and emotions, felt. This feeling spurs imagination, thinking, and actions. It beholds the power of transporting us to a different time and world. This journey between our eyes to mind makes us appreciate them.
Some of the painters have been immortalized in our hearts. They managed to show us how much beauty can our hands produce. There are countless artists who are remembered for their efforts to keep this art form alive. While focusing on a few major artists, we might comprehend why we still talk about them.
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1. Vincent Van Gogh
Vincent Van Gogh, Self-Portrait
Born: 30 March 1853
Died: 29 July 1890
Native Place: Zundert, Netherlands
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas, Watercolor Paintings
Movement: Post-Impressionism
Notable Creations: Sorrow (1882), The Potato Eaters (1885), Sunflowers (1887), Bedroom in Arles (1888), The Starry Night (1889), Portrait of Dr. Gachet (1890), Wheatfield with Crows(1890)
What made him one of the famous painters:
In just over a decade he created about 2,100 artworks, including around 860oil paintings, most of which date from the last two years of his life.
From the Starry Night to his self-portrait, Gogh, a Dutch painter, initiated a new phase of painting. The striking color, emphatic brushwork, and contoured forms of his work powerfully influenced the current of Expressionism in modern art.
Vincent van Gogh’s residence in The Hague during 1882 and 1883 proved to be a productive period in which he continued to hone his technique and explore similar yet fresh subject matter. After the death of his father and a failed love affair, his artistic development took a bleak backdrop. Nonetheless, this didn’t stop him from growing further.
The ability of depiction of movement in the Starry Night through brush strokes makes us realize his ahead of time skills. World of shades and texture was given a new life by him. After succumbing to mental illness, his hands dropped the brush. He left behind a legacy in the form of living miracles on the planet. These will live to keep reminding us of the magic that his hands held.
2. Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Born: 25 October 1881
Died:8 April 1973
Native Place:Malaga, Spain
Art Styles:Oil on Canvas, Collage Paintings
Movement: Cubism,Surrealism
Notable Creations: La Vie (1903), Family of Saltimbanques (1905), Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907), Portrait of Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler (1910), Girl before a Mirror (1932), Le Rêve (1932), Guernica (1937), The Weeping Woman(1937)
What made him one of the famous painters:
Associated most of all with pioneeringCubism, alongsideGeorges Braque, he also inventedcollageand made major contributions toSymbolismandSurrealism.
He was not only a great painter but also a sculptor, printmaker, ceramics artist, etching artist, and writer. At a tender age of 13, he went to study in the School of Fine Arts in Barcelona and later to Spain’s most prestigious institution of art in Madrid. Picasso started his artistic journey with a touch of a specific color. Owing to his interest in shades of blue during the 1900s, this period was termed as Picasso’s Blue Period. The Blue period was followed by the Rose Period, Crystal Period.
What Picasso brought out in his painting were the concepts of neoclassicism and surrealism. Paintings like the Peasants Sleeping and Three Dancers stand out as few effective examples. Even with this innovation, Picasso lived in extreme poverty for several years. To keep himself warm, he had to burn some of his paintings as well.
As one of the greatest influences on the course of 20th-century art, Pablo Picasso often mixed various styles to create wholly new interpretations of what he saw. He was a driving force in the development of Cubism, and he elevated collage to the level of fine art.
3. Leonardo Da Vinci
Leonardo Da Vinci
Born:14/15 April 1452
Died:2 May 1519
Native Place:Vinci, Republic of Florence (present-day Italy)
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas, Drawings, Scientific Diagrams
Movement:High Renaissance
Notable Creations:Mona Lisa, The Last Supper, Lady with an Ermine, Virgin of the Rocks, The Vitruvian Man, Salvator Mundi
What made him one of the famous painters:
He was was anItalianpolymathof theRenaissancewhose areas of interest included invention, drawing, painting, sculpture, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, paleontology, and cartography.
Talking of Da Vinci, we not just come across his masterpieces in art but in science and teaching, as well. He virtually contributed to everything he touched. His artistic exploration began at a young age with an apprenticeship under a profound sculptor artist. This apprenticeship was the onset of a great journey. Similar to his fellows, he began his work by focusing on religious art. In his work, he kept Virgin and Christ at the center stage.
During his time in Milan, he painted Virgin of The Rocks, a six-foot-tall altarpiece. Leonardo began experimenting with a unique technique of blending the edges of objects. This particular technique gave a smoky effect called sfumato.
He learned using oil-based color instead of water ones, as they blended with much more effectiveness. Henceforth, The Last Supper was oil-based. This art piece earned Da Vinci the title of a legend. How can we not mention the greatest portrait of all times, Mona Lisa, when we talk about this artist.
Mona Lisa is still considered one of the best artworks of all time. Owing to the aspect of ‘the mysterious smile’, it was seen as a complicated and mythical painting. His capability of portraying a simple housewife, Mona Lisa, as a mysterious seductress, only adds to the reasons for his success.
4. Claude Monet
Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Portrait of Claude Monet, 1875, Musée d’Orsay
Born: 14 November 1840
Died:5 December 1926
Native Place:Paris, France
Art Styles:Oil on Canvas
Movement:Impressionism
Notable Creations: Impression; Sunrise, Rouen Cathedral series, London Parliament series, water Lilies, Haystacks, Poplars
What made him one of the famous painters:
The term “Impressionism” is derived from the title of his paintingImpression, soleil levant(Impression, Sunrise), which was exhibited in 1874 in the first of the independent exhibitions mounted by Monet and his associates as an alternative to theSalon de Paris.
Oscar Claude Monet developed a peculiar method of producing repeated motifs in the series. His masterpieces like the Haystacks and Rouen Cathedral are some famous testimonies like other artists whose popular paintings were mostly landscapes, Monet’s usage of impressionism in his work brought him fame. His domesticated paintings focusing on his middle-class family and home stood out in the world of strokes and canvas.
The Beach at Sainte-Adresse (1867) gives a clear accounting of Monet’s advance toward the Impressionist style. In the beach and sea pictures of 1865–67 Monet was plainly not trying to reproduce faithfully the scene before him as examined in detail but rather attempting to record on the spot the impression that relaxed, momentary vision might receive.
Monet also used his surroundings as a source of inspiration for his work. For instance, the water lily paintings were inspired by the water lilies around his home. The concept of embracing spatiality was new to the world of paintings.
5. Rembrandt van Rijn
Rembrandt van Rijn
Born:15 July 1606
Died:4 October 1669
Native Place:Leiden,Dutch Republic(now theNetherlands)
Art Styles:
Movement: Dutch Golden Age, Baroque
Notable Creations: Self-portraits, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp (1632), Belshazzar’s Feast (1635), The Night Watch (1642), Bathsheba at Her Bath (1654), Syndics of the Drapers’ Guild (1662), The Hundred Guilder Print(etching, c.1647–1649)
What made him one of the famous painters:
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn was a Dutchdraughtsman,painterandprintmaker. An innovative and prolificmasterin threemedia,he is generally considered one of the greatestvisual artistsin thehistory of artand the most important in Dutch art history.
Rembrandt, a Dutch printmaker, was acknowledged as a stalwart in art but also in storytelling. Working through the 17th century, he was known as a painter of lights and shades. His marvelous paintings gave a new meaning to the genre of realism in paintings. Some critics claimed his preference of ugliness over beauty.
The Night Watch and The Jewish Bride were some artworks that made him emerge as a brilliant artist. His early years of painting comprised mainly of portraits. However, over the course of time, this reduced.
He shifted towards the genre of self-portrait. His face became his own prime subject. His approach to composition and his rendering of space and light—like his handling of contour, form, and color, his brushwork, and (in his drawings and etchings) his treatment of line and tone—are subject to gradual (or sometimes abrupt) transformation, even within a single work.
Rembrandt also made history paintings, mainly biblical scenes. A number of these works, in the form of grisailles, were apparently done with an ambitious series of prints in mind, which together were to constitute a Passion series. However, his religious background is still unknown. Another aspect of Rembrandt’s genius is the acute and loving attention with which he observed the world around him.
In his renderings of women and children and of animals and landscapes, he showed a strong understanding of the significant detail, but he noted these impressions with extraordinary freedom and economy. It is widely believed that he died a poor and misunderstood death. Nonetheless, his legacy has lived on to bring honor to the dutch community.
6. Michelangelo
Michelangelo
Born: 6 March 1475
Died:18 February 1564
Native Place: CapresenearArezzo,Republic of Florence(present-dayTuscany, Italy)
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas, Fresco Paintings
Movement:High Renaissance
Notable Creations:David, Pietà, Moses, The Last Judgment, Sistine Chapel ceiling
What made him one of the famous painters:
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni was the first Western artist whosebiography was published while he was alive. In fact, two biographies were published during his lifetime. In his lifetime, Michelangelo was often calledIl Divino(“the divine one”)
After the success of Paintings like Sleeping Cupid Affair, he relocated himself in Rome. Within years of reputation and popularity, Michelangelo once again moved to Florence, where he was commissioned by the Cathedral of Florence to make the sculptor of David.
This sculptor became the world’s most famous sculptor and still finds its place as a great art piece. It is his great hands that also completed the painting of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. He was commissioned by various Italian rulers & popes for sculpting and painting.
He aced the art of fresco painting after acquiring it from his elders. This, in particular, changed the course of his career as it earned him great reputation. He was especially interested in the human body. He viewed it as the physical representation of the soul. His unique thought process can be seen from his paintings in the Sistine Chapel.
Even during the high renaissance, he portrays a marriage between the Catholic Church and Greek Mythology. He would often be paranoid of people stealing his sketches. Therefore, he was fiercely protective of his sketches.
7. Salvador Dali
Salvador Dali
Born:11 May 1904
Died:23 January 1989
Native Place:Figueres,Catalonia,Spain
Art Styles:Oil on Canvas
Movement: Cubism, Dada, Surrealism
Notable Creations:The Persistence of Memory (1931), Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War) (1936), Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening (1944), Galatea of the Spheres (1952), Crucifixion (Corpus Hypercubus) (1954)
What made him one of the famous painters:
Dalí produced over 1,500 paintings in his career. in addition to producing illustrations for books, lithographs, designs for theatre sets and costumes, a great number of drawings, dozens of sculptures, and various other projects, including an animated short film forDisney. He also collaborated with director Jack Bond in 1965, creating a movie titledDalí in New York.
Spanish artist and Surrealist icon Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí I Domènech, 1st Marquis of Dalí de Púbol is perhaps best known for his painting of melting clocks, The Persistence of Memory. Other than his paintings, he was quite popular for his unique mustache.
From an early age, Dalí was encouraged to practice his art, and he would eventually go on to study at an academy in Madrid. In the 1920s, he went to Paris and began interacting with artists such as Picasso, Magritte, and Miró, which led to Dalí’s first Surrealist phase.
His initial experimentations include oil paintings of small collages of his dream images. His work employed a meticulous classical technique, influenced by Renaissance artists, that contradicted the “unreal dream” space that he created with strange hallucinatory characters.
Salvador Dali experimented with various styles of art ranging from Impressionism, Pointillism, Futurism, Purism, Cubism, and Neo-Cubism. He tried to improvise these styles of art but this didn’t gain him any fame. It was in Surrealism that Dali finally found the method to express his imagination and attract the attention of the art world.
In the early 1930s, Dali developed the paranoiac-critical method, which is regarded as his most important contribution to Surrealism. It was a technique through which the artist attempted to tap into his subconscious through systematic irrational thought and a self-induced paranoid state. This famous painter & legend of surrealism passed away in 1989 due to heart failure. He is seen as a mysterious artist with an innovative mind.
8. Johannes Vermeer
Detail of the painting The Procuress (c. 1656), believed to be a self-portrait by Vermeer
Born:October 1632
Died:December 1675
Native Place:Delft, Dutch Republic
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas
Movement: Dutch, Golden Age Baroque
Notable Creations: The Girl with a Pearl Earring, The Wine Glass, The MilkMaid
What made him one of the famous painters:
Vermeer’s works were largely overlooked by art historians for two centuries after his death. A select number of connoisseurs in the Netherlands did appreciate his work, yet even so, many of his works were attributed to better-known artists such asMetsuorMieris.
Johannes Vermeer, a Dutch artist who created paintings that are among the most beloved and revered images in the history of art. Although only about 36 of his paintings survive, these rare works are among the greatest treasures in the world’s finest museums.
Vermeer began his career in the early 1650s by painting large-scale biblical and mythological scenes, but most of his later paintings—the ones for which he is most famous—depict scenes of daily life in interior settings. These works are remarkable for their purity of light and form, qualities that convey a serene, timeless sense of dignity.
Vermeer also painted cityscapes and allegorical scenes. His early life include growing up around weavers and breweries. Surprisingly not much is known about his decision to start painting. He acquired his art lessons from the Guild of Saint Luke but their identity or art style remains a mystery.
Like many others, he used the objects of daily life in his paintings. He mastered the art of light-filled interiors. Girl with a Pearl Earring and The Allegory of Painting are some of his most reputed artworks. Colors and pigments were key elements in his paintings. Due to his excellence in them, he earned the title of the ‘Master of Light’. However, his bright and colorful world was a mere desire in his eyes.
9. Edvard Munch
Edvard Munch
Born:12 December 1863
Died:23 January 1944
Native Place:Ådalsbruk,Løten,Norway
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas, Pencil Drawings
Movement: Expressionism, Symbolism
Notable Creations: The Scream, Madonna, The Sick Child
What made him one of the famous painters:
When Munch died, his remaining works were bequeathed to the city of Oslo, which built theMunch MuseumatTøyen(it opened in 1963). The museum holds a collection of approximately 1,100 paintings, 4,500 drawings, and 18,000 prints, the broadest collection of his works in the world.
Edvard Munch is best known as being a Norwegian born, expressionist painter, and printer. In the late 20th century, he played a great role in German expressionism and the art form that later followed; namely because of the strong mental anguish that was displayed in many of the pieces that he created. Edvard Munch was born in Norway in 1863 and was raised in Christiania (known as Oslo today). He was related to famous painters and artists in their own right.
A majority of the works which Edvard Munch created, were referred to like the style known as symbolism. This is mainly because of the fact that the paintings he made focused on the internal view of the objects, as opposed to the exterior, and what the eye could see.
Symbolist painters believed that art should reflect an emotion or idea rather than represent the natural world in the objective, quasi-scientific manner embodied by Realism and Impressionism.
Munch’s own deeply original style crystallized about 1892. The flowing, tortuous use of line in his new paintings. Among his most famous paintings are the paintings of love and death, exhibited under the title of Frieze of life. The Voice and The Kiss are a few other examples. Munch effectively touched the theme of suffering due to love. Even his titles depicted this particular theme.
Munch’s massive output of graphic art—consisting of etchings, drypoints, lithographs, and woodcuts—began in 1894. The principal attraction to him of printmaking was that it enabled him to communicate his message to a much larger number of people, but it also afforded him exciting opportunities for experimentation.
10. Raphael
Raphael
Born:March 28 or April 6, 1483
Died:
Native Place: Urbino, Duchy of Urbino
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas
Movement: High Renaissance
Notable Creations:Giovanni Santi, Portrait ofGuidobaldo da Montefeltro, TheWedding of the Virgin, Saint George and the Dragon
What made him one of the famous painters:
Many of his works are found in the Vatican Palace, where the frescoedRaphael Roomswere the central, and the largest, work of his career. The best known work isThe School of Athensin the VaticanStanza della Segnatura.
A leading figure of Italian High Renaissance classicism, Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino is best known for his “Madonnas,” including the Sistine Madonna, and for his large figure compositions in the Palace of the Vatican in Rome. Raphael’s father was a painter for the Duke of Urbino. He taught the young Raphael basic painting techniques and exposed him to the principles of humanistic philosophy at the Duke of Urbino’s court.
In many of his earliest offerings, egg tempera was used – a mixture common with artists of this period, including Perugino. By the time he settled in Rome, however, all of Raphael’s paintings were executed entirely in oil.
Raphael seems to have experimented with the oil medium, perhaps in order to achieve the greater depth of shadow and richer colors associated with the oil medium, but another consideration may have been the fact that it would have been easier for him to revise his assistants’ work in oil than it was in fresco. His death was unusual and mysterious. He died at a very young age without any explanation, while working on canvas.
11. Pierre- Auguste Renoir
Pierre- Auguste Renoir
Born: 25 February 1841
Died: 3 December 1919
Native Place: Limoges,France
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas
Movement: Impressionism
Notable Creations: Bal du moulin de la Galette(1876), Luncheon of the Boating Party (1880), Nude (1910)
What made him one of the famous painters:
Renoir was the first Impressionist to perceive the potential limitations of an art-based primarily on optical sensation and light effects. Diana the Huntress and La Grenouillère were some of the famous works that earned his reputation.
After years as a struggling painter, Renoir helped launch an artistic movement called Impressionism in the 1870s. He eventually became one of the most highly regarded artists of his time. Renoir was born into a family of artisans. His father, a tailor who had seven children, moved with his family to Paris about 1845.
Renoir demonstrated his gift at an early age. Quickly recognizing his talent, his parents apprenticed him, at age 13, to work in a porcelain factory, where he learned to decorate plates with bouquets of flowers.
Circumstances encouraged Renoir to attempt new freedom and experimentation in his style. there is a decidedly human element to his work that sets him apart. Renoir had a brilliant eye for both intimate domesticity and the day’s fashions, and his images of content families and well-dressed Parisian pleasure-seekers created a bridge from Impressionism’s more experimental aims to a modern, middle-class art public.
12. Raja Ravi Verma
Raja Ravi Verma
Born:29 April 1848
Died: 2 October 1906
Native Place: Kilimanoor, Travancore (present-day Kerala, India)
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas
Movement: NA
Notable Creations: Shakuntala;Nair Lady Adorning Her Hair;There Comes Papa;Galaxy of Musicians
What made him one of the famous painters:
Raja Ravi Varma is regarded as the first modern Indian artist due to his ability to reconcile Western aesthetics with Indian iconography.
Varma was an Indian famous painter and artist, considered one of the greatest painters in the history of Indian art. Raja Ravi Varma is known for his amazing paintings, which revolves mainly around the Puranas (ancient mythological stories) and the great Indian epics – Mahabharata and Ramayana.
Ravi Varma is one of the few painters who managed to accomplish a beautiful union of Indian tradition with the techniques of European academic art. This is one of the reasons why he is considered as one of the most, if not the most prominent Indian painters.
Raja Ravi Varma started his career at a young age and soon enjoyed widespread recognition for his works. In 1873, his paintings were not only exhibited at a prominent exhibition in Vienna, but he also won an award for one of his displays.
Varma was the first Indian to use Western techniques of perspective and composition and to adapt them to Indian subjects, styles, and themes. He won the Governor’s Gold Medal in 1873 for the painting Nair Lady Adorning Her Hair.
Varma was criticized severely by later artists who saw the content of his work as only superficially Indian because, despite depicting mythological Indian themes, it imitated Western styles of painting. How we see Indian Goddess Saraswati today, with a peacock by her side or an elephant with a garland at its trunk – in reverence to a splendid Lakshmi who’s risen on a lotus with poise – is thanks to Realist famous painter, Raja Ravi Varma.
Oil as a medium was just being introduced, and not many who knew the technique. Ravi Varma taught himself the medium by observing a Dutch famous painter, Theodor Janson, who was on a visit to the court. On 2nd October 1906, he left behind the worldly joys.
13. El Greco
El Greco
Born: 1 October 1541
Died: 7 April 1614
Native Place: Heraklion,Crete
Art Styles:Oil on Canvas
Movement:Mannerism
Notable Creations: El Expolio (1577–1579), The Assumption of the Virgin (1577–1579), The Burial of the Count of Orgaz (1586–1588), View of Toledo (1596–1600), Opening of the Fifth Seal (1608–1614)
What made him one of the famous painters:
El Greco is regarded as a precursor of bothExpressionismandCubism, while his personality and works were a source of inspiration for poets and writers such asRainer Maria RilkeandNikos Kazantzakis.
El Greco is probably one of the most well-known artists of his time, and still to this day, over 500 years after his death. Because of the obscurity in his style, and the fact that he was considered a famous painter of the spirit, he was one of the most influential and famous painters, which set the groundwork for many to follow, and for many art forms that followed. Born in Crete, he contributed towards icon painting. He lived in Italy and explored the vast world of art and drawing..
A tendency to dramatize rather than describe marks the painter’s work, articulated through bold, unreal choices in color, and the juxtaposition of highlights next to dark, thick outlines. El Greco’s work has also been cited as a precursor to Expressionism for its presentation of the emotional in ways that had not been articulated before.
He is also said to have had an influence on the Cubists, most notably Pablo Picasso, because of the way his paintings reconsidered form and figure beyond literal reality. The Disrobing of Christ and View of Toledo are undisputedly his famous artworks. He died in Spain during his stay in 1614.
14. Amrita Shergil
Amrita Shergil
Born:30 January 1913
Died: 5 December 1941
Native Place:Budapest,Kingdom of Hungary
Art Styles: Oil on Canvas
Movement: NA
Notable Creations:Self Portraits, Hungarian Gypsy Girl,Young Girls, 1932
What made her one of the famous painters:
Sher-Gil’s early paintings display a significant influence of theWesternmodes of painting, especially as practiced in the Bohemian circles of Paris in the early 1930s. Her 1932oil painting,Young Girls, came as a breakthrough for her; the work won her accolades, including a gold medal and election as an Associate of the Grand Salon in Paris in 1933.
Amrita Shergil, a famous painter who was one of the pioneers of the modern movement in Indian art. Born in Hungary, she found fame as an Indian painter. In India, Sher-Gil’s first effort was to find a mode of delineation appropriate to her Indian subjects. Influenced in particular by the wall paintings of the Ajanta Caves in western India, she attempted to fuse their aesthetic with the European oil painting techniques she had learned in Paris.
Her style was in marked contrast to that of her contemporaries. It wouldn’t be wrong to call her an activist for feminism, as she routinely portrayed the lives of daily women in India during the 20th century. Her famous artwork Three Girls is a testimony to this.
The contrast between the colors of the faces and their bright clothes is symbolic. This also sets Amrita as the origin of change in the world of art for and by women in India. With her style and her emphasis on women, Sher-Gil became known as the “Indian Frida Kahlo.”
She understood the loneliness of her subjects well since their moods were a reflection of her own. Because of her upbringing, she lived between worlds, often searching for a sense of belonging. Sher-Gil’s legacy has grown in recent years. Unesco, the cultural organization of the United Nations, declared 2013, the 100th anniversary of her birth, the international year of Amrita Sher-Gil.
15. Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse
Born: 31 December 1869
Died: 3 November 1954
Native Place: Le Cateau-Cambrésis, France
Art Styles:Oil on Canvas
Movement: Fauvism, Modernism, Post-Impressionism
Notable Creations: Woman with a Hat (1905), The Joy of Life (1906), Nu bleu (1907), La Danse (1909), L’Atelier Rouge (1911)
What made him one of the famous painters:
His mastery of the expressive language of colour and drawing, displayed in a body of work spanning over a half-century, won him recognition as a leading figure inmodern art.
Matisse was a French artist, leader of the Fauve group, regarded as one of the most famous painters in 20th-century art, a master of the use of color and form to convey emotional expression.
Matisse was born the son of a middle-class family, he studied and began to practice law. In 1890, however, while recovering slowly from an attack of appendicitis, he became intrigued by the practice of painting. In 1892, having given up his law career, he went to Paris to study art formally. His first teachers were academically trained and relatively conservative; Matisse’s own early style was a conventional form of naturalism, and he made many copies after the old masters.
He also studied more contemporary art, especially that of the impressionists, and he began to experiment, earning a reputation as a rebellious member of his studio classes. If one is seeking creative inspiration, one needs to look no further than the artistic output of Henri Matisse, one of modern art’s greats. Dance and Fauvism were integral parts of his paintings. Henri died in 1954 in Nice, France.
Conclusion
To conclude, the history of art isn’t just about brushes, canvas or paintings but also about people who brought it to life. These Famous painters and, many mire artists relentlessly worked for their passion and ended up being legends. What one sees in a painting is not just colors but the emotions felt while stroking those colors by a brush. The emotion of the painter is what really makes a difference in the painting.
Without the contribution of these marvelous artists, we would have been far away from the magic of colors, lights, and shadows. They taught us how one color can hold different meanings. How the one shade can be a symbol of two opposite things. They were keen on bringing out a contrast between the objects. Here is an article about All The Types of Paintings, their styles, and techniques.
We tend to forget that the power of seeing the beauty of the world is possible only when we want to keep our eyes open. These paintings are the epitome of the willingness to keep the eyes open. If it were not these artists who appreciated the beauty of the world, we would be left clueless about this art.
It is also interesting to note that history lies within art and not stones or walls. A piece of paper is mightier than rocks. One’s legacy can last eternity through these artforms. As they rightly call famous painters the mediators of society, we also realize the value of artists in our world. The power of a painting to simply deliver a complicated message visually astounds us.
One would definitely wonder why this art has almost been eternal? The much-overlooked answer is its reachability. While the language of words lies within the hands of its own speakers, the universal language of visual imagery crosses these lines.
FAQs
Who is the No 1 painter in the world now? ›
Gerhard Richter is at the very top of our list—the most famous living painter today.
What is the name of famous painters? ›There is no artist more legendary than Leonardo da Vinci. In the entire History of Art, no other name has generated more debates, more discussions and more hours of study than the genius born in Vinci in 1452, who will be always known as the author of the most famous painting of all times, the Gioconda or Mona Lisa.
Who is the best painter of the 20th century? ›- Pablo Picasso. Pablo Picasso's Girl with a Mandolin (1910) | Pablo Picasso's Head of a Woman (1909) ...
- Jean-Michel Basquiat. ...
- Salvador Dalí ...
- Wassily Kandinsky. ...
- Claude Monet. ...
- Frida Kahlo. ...
- Piet Mondrian. ...
- Andy Warhol.
- Xie Lei. B. 1983, Huainan, China. Lives and works in Paris.
- Miranda Forrester. B. London. Lives and works in London.
- Mongezi Ncaphayi. B. 1983, Benoni, South Africa. Lives and works in Cape Town.
- Yulia Iosilzon. B. 1992, Moscow. ...
- Yu Qiping. B. 1957, Nanjing, China.
- 1. ' Mona Lisa' ...
- 'The Last Supper' Visitors take photos of "The Last Supper" ("Il Cenacolo or L'Ultima Cena") at the Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, Italy. ...
- 'The Starry Night' ...
- 'The Scream' ...
- 'Guernica' ...
- 'The Kiss' ...
- 'Girl With a Pearl Earring' ...
- 'The Birth of Venus'
The richest painters in 2022 are led by John Currin
Three of his most famous works are Hot Pants, Honeymoon Nude, and Nude on a Table.
Name | Lifespan | Age |
---|---|---|
Manuel Álvarez Bravo | 1902–2002 | 100 |
Max Angus | 1914–2017 | 102 |
Duffy Ayers | 1915–2017 | 102 |
Unity Bainbridge | 1916–2017 | 101 |
Widely considered to be the most famous painting in the world, the Mona Lisa has delighted onlookers ever since it was painted in the early 1500s by Leonardo da Vinci. The painting is named for Lisa del Giocondo, a member of a wealthy family of Florence.
Who is the youngest famous painter? ›What is this? Arushi Bhatnagar is the youngest artist as she had her first solo exhibition when she was only 344 days old. She started to paint at the age of four and has set the Guinness World Record for the youngest professional artist.
What is the number 1 famous painting? ›Mona Lisa, Paris
It is no surprise that the number one painting on our list is the famous Mona Lisa. The enigmatic painting of the smiling woman painted by the greatest Leonardo da Vinci dates back to 1503 to 15019.
Who is the most famous painter in England? ›
- William Hogarth (1697-1764)
- Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792)
- Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788)
- John Constable (1776-1837)
- Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851)
- John Everett Millais (1829-1896)
- Alfred Sisley (1839-1899)
- 3 more.
Bob Ross, in full Robert Norman Ross, (born October 29, 1942, Daytona Beach, Florida, U.S.—died July 4, 1995, New Smyrna Beach, Florida), American painter and television personality whose popular PBS television show The Joy of Painting (1983–94) made him a household name as the painting teacher to the masses.
What famous painter died in the 1970s? ›Meet Benjamin West, born on October 10, 1738, and widely considered to be America's first great fine-art painter.
Who was the best painter in the 15th century? ›Leonardo da Vinci. The richness, the variety, and even the inherent contradictions of 15th-century Florentine painting are both embodied and transformed in the art and the person of the multifaceted genius Leonardo da Vinci.
Who is the best black painter? ›- Robert Seldon Duncanson (1821 – 1872)
- Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller (1877–1968)
- Edmonia Lewis (1844 – 1907)
- Augusta Savage (1892 – 1962)
- Joshua Johnson (c. 1763 – c. 1824)
- Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859 – 1937)
- Jacob Lawrence (1917 – 2000)
- Kara Walker (b. 1969)
The Venetian Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696–1770) was arguably the greatest painter of eighteenth-century Europe and the outstanding first master of the Grand Manner.
Who is the hottest artist of 2022? ›Billboard: While “Heat Waves” by Glass Animals was secured the top spot on Billboard's 2022 year-end Hot 100 Songs chart, Bad Bunny was 2022's biggest winner, becoming the first Latin artist to rank as the top artist of the year and with his album Un Verano Sin Ti winning the designation as the top album (it was also ...
Who is the most colorful painter? ›- The Bridges of Amsterdam by Leonid Afremov. ...
- Bella Ragazza by Patrice Murciano. ...
- The Red Vineyard by Vincent van Gogh. ...
- Supernumerary by Joshua Petker. ...
- The Nun by Andy Warhol. ...
- Love Is Following the Flow Together by Jane Small. ...
- Heloise by Francoise Nielly. ...
- Break Time by Ivey Hayes.
The largest art theft in world history occurred in Boston on March 18, 1990 when thieves stole 13 pieces, collectively valued at $500 million, from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Among the pieces stolen was Vermeer's The Concert, which is considered to be the most valuable stolen painting in the world.
What is the most painted thing in the world? ›
Carnegie Mellon University students painted a fence for 70 years, with the Guinness Book of World Records calling it “the most painted object in the world” with six inches of paint covering it.
Who is the top 3 artist in the world? ›Popularity ranking | Artist | |
---|---|---|
01 | Drake | Track artist |
02 | Rihanna | Track artist |
03 | Coldplay | Track artist |
04 | Eminem | Track artist |
- 1/ Jeff Koons – 1955 – USA. ...
- 2/ Peter Doig – 1959 – Scotland. ...
- 3/ Christopher Wool – 1955 – USA. ...
- 4 – Zeng Fanzhi – 1964 – China. ...
- 5 – Damian Hirst – 1965 – UK.
This is a list of the highest known prices paid for paintings. The current record price is approximately US$450.3 million (which includes commission), paid for Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi ( c. 1500).
What is the highest paid artist painting? ›The current record price is US$91 million for Jeff Koons's 1986 sculpture, Rabbit, set in 2019. The current record price for a painting is $90 million for David Hockney's 1972 Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures), set the prior year. Ref.
What kind of painter makes the most money? ›The highest-paid painter job is a painter foreman.
Painter Foremen earn an average salary of $47,687, which is $ 22.93 hourly.
Probably the most popular example of the "mad artist" stereotype was none other than famously talented painter Vincent van Gogh. "I put my heart and my soul into my work, and lost my mind in the process," he once said. Van Gogh was said to have suffered from depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorder.
Who is the creepy painter? ›Helen Otis aka “Bloody Painter” is a fictional serial killer character from a three-part creepypasta story of the same name.
Who started painting first? ›The first painting was made by primitive men, believed to have been made by Homo Neanderthalis in the prehistoric era. Archaeological excavations carried out in Europe, Africa and Asia reveal that primitive men were the first painters and sculptors and demonstrated through these arts their daily lives.
Who started painting at 40? ›Claude Monet
After the death of Monet's wife, when he was in his 40s, Monet began really painting.
Who painted the first masterpiece? ›
...
Masterpiece (Lichtenstein)
Masterpiece | |
---|---|
Movement | Pop art |
Dimensions | 137 cm × 137 cm (54 in × 54 in) |
Location | Private collection |
Jan Van Eyck's The Just Judges
Part of the world's first major oil painting –– Hubert and Jan van Eyck's Adoration of the Mystic Lamb or Ghent Altarpiece –– The Just Judges remains missing years after it disappeared in 1934.
Leonardo's Last Supper (1495–98) is among the most famous paintings in the world. In its monumental simplicity, the composition of the scene is masterful; the power of its effect comes from the striking contrast in the attitudes of the 12 disciples as counterposed to Christ.
Where is the most famous painting in the world? ›Unsurprisingly, the most visited painting in the world is also the most famous portrait ever painted – the Mona Lisa. Created by Leonardo da Vinci at the start of the 16th century, it's valued at well over $660 million. The painting has been on display in the Louvre on and off since 1797.
Who is the youngest female painter? ›The record for the youngest professional artist was achieved by Arushi Bhatnagar (India, b. 1 June 2002). She had her first solo exhibition at the Kalidasa Akademi in Ujjain, India, on 11 May 2003 when she was 344 days (or 11 months) old.
Who is the best 10 year old artist? ›Such is the case for Andres Valencia. At just 10 years old, the talented abstract painter has accomplished many of the things that career artists dream of. He's had a solo showcase at Art Miami, a one-person show at New York gallery Chase Contemporary, and he's sold his pieces totaling over $100,000.
Who is the talented 8 year old artist? ›Meet Advait Kolarkar: the 8-year-old art prodigy unveiling his first solo exhibition in London.
Who is the king of painters? ›President and Owner, Robert Lyon, established King of the Painters Co. in 1975. He graduated from San Diego State University with degrees in Maketing and Art, providing the platform for a successful painting company. He is a leading expert in color and finishes, and some even refer to him as the "King of Color".
Are there any billionaire painters? ›John Currin is currently the richest painter in the world, with an estimated worth of a whopping $1.4 billion thanks to his unique and sought-after painting style.
Who is the best painter in the century? ›- Pablo Picasso. Pablo Picasso's Girl with a Mandolin (1910) | Pablo Picasso's Head of a Woman (1909) ...
- Jean-Michel Basquiat. ...
- Salvador Dalí ...
- Wassily Kandinsky. ...
- Claude Monet. ...
- Frida Kahlo. ...
- Piet Mondrian. ...
- Andy Warhol.
Who bought the 110 million dollar painting? ›
Estimated at US$60 million dollars, Maezawa acquired the painting for a record-breaking US$110 million dollars. This meant that Basquiat overtook his friend, Andy Warhol's US$105-million-dollar painting, Silver Car Crash (Double Disaster, 1963), as the most valuable American artist.
What famous artist never sold a painting? ›'Never sold a painting in his life – but died worth $100m': the incredible story of Boris Lurie.
What are the 5 most expensive paintings in the world? ›- Mona Lisa – Leonardo da Vinci. ...
- Interchange – Willem de Kooning. ...
- Nafea Faa Ipoipo (When Will You Marry?) ...
- The Card Players — Paul Cézanne. ...
- Number 17A – Jackson Pollock. ...
- No. ...
- Portrait of Marten Soolmans and Portrait of Oopjen Coppit — Rembrandt.