Art essentials

My favorite music often turns out to be mixes, when it comes to modern stuff.

I keep checking the Emm Kuo site to see if she's got any bright blue, delicate, wide, glowing snakeskin [almost briefcase like] bags after seeing her incredible work at AuCourantDaily and MP here.

Be sure to enjoy and relearn about Pre-Raphaelite [1850s-1890s] classics like Waterhouse ie his famous "The Lady of Shalott", I love his unqiue, not well known "Sleep and his half-brother death", which is really neat and Roman-esque. His other odd, unique piece is "Saint Eulalia", what a legend!

Make sure you know his famous "Cleopatra", his "Dolce far Niente" [it's sweet to do nothing], the similarly famous "Magic Circle", his "Ophelia" painting, his "Circe" painting about the sorceress and Ulysses, his scene from the Renaissance Italy "Decameron" story set by Boccaccio.

Also, there's his famous "Hylas and the Nymphs" which you'll probably know, his "Juliet" from Romeo and Juliet, his "Pandora", his "Tristan and Isolde" drinking the love potion, "Nymphs finding the head of Orpheus" after the maenads tear him apart, "The Siren" luring a sailor to death, his "Annunciation", his "The Charmer" and a ton of other Greek and Roman inspired work I will not profile here as it's lesser know, it will be focused on in the future.

Some Pre-Raphaelites did mostly Renaissance medieval, Biblical and mythic themes, they loved romance and poetry--others in the same time period were more neo-classical, focusing on ancient Greece and Rome. Others painted scenes of the Arab world, both real and imagined, called 'Orientalism'.

Lawrence Alma-Tadema is a more classical painter--his work is exceptional, often Merovingian [ie Clovis, king of ancient France] or Egyptian, like his "Egyptian chess players". His work often is similar to Godward [who will get his own post], like his famous paintings "Silver Favorites", "The Roses of Heliogabalus", "Unconscious Rivals", "Spring"--he did the very famous "The Finding of Moses" and "Sappho and Alcaeus" [famous ancient Greek poets and lovers]

There's Millais ie. for his famous "Ophelia", and "Isabella" about Renaissance Italy. There's also Cowper for his very famous works, see all here: his "Fair Rosamund and Eleanor" about the mythic jealousy between to the two famous women, his beautiful "St. Agnes in prison" with an angel, his gorgeous painting "Vanity" [1907], his very famous "La belle dame sans merci" based on the poem,

There's also Hunt ie. his famous version of "The Lady of Shalott" looking at her mirror in her tower as she works [tons of tiny details in that one, study it], and of course the cream of the crop Godward. There's also the great Léon Comerre, with his work "The favorite" above. If you like Les Mis be sure to see his painting of little Cosette with the doll, it's heart breaking and really beautiful [and I'm not even very into Hugo's novels].

There's William Morris's work, like his "La belle Iseult", and Rossetti has a few paintings that go beyond form and achieve greatness [like his infamous "Ecce Ancilla Domini" [Latin: behold the haidmaid of the Lord] of the Annunciation, and his "Proserpine" ie Persephone], and if you like Klimt be sure to try Galileo Chini.

Also try scandalous Aubrey Beardsley if you like drawings and illustration better than full scale paintings. Edward Burne-Jones's works look like tapestries.