This excellent work, acquired in 2002 by the National Gallery, may be considered as one of Volanakis’ most free “impressionistic” achievements. Painted in Munich, it depicts fishermen pulling the nets at sunrise. The boat and the fishermen are shown as silhouettes, as the light is coming from behind, from the background. The sky and the waves are flooded with light, which is rendered in orange and violet tones. The brushwork is free, and the entire work pulsates with life.
The “Crucifixion” of Christ and the two thieves, the good and the bad, was painted by Andreas Pavias in the latter half of the 15th century, using egg tempera on a wood panel, that is, adhering to the traditional Byzantine iconography process.
The scene is dramatically narrated in many episodes, against a flat golden background. Reminding us that we are dealing with an idealistic rather than a realistic painting, in Byzantine art the golden background denotes the sky; the figures are divine, transcendental, existing outside of time and place, in the infinite space-time. The figures seem lit from within themselves rather than by an external source of light. The scene is arranged in three levels, leading the eye upward, without perspective or depth. On the bottom left is depicted the resurrection of the dead, who can be seen rising from their graves; on the right hand side, the painter has portrayed the soldiers, playing dice for Christ’s crimson robe. In the middle ground, there is the colourful crowd, witnessing the tragic event; the main scene shows the Madonna fainting, supported by the Holy Women and St John, while St Magdalene is throwing her arms around the Holy Cross in lament. A colourful crowd in exotic costumes and hats, horses and a wealth of details complete the scene. On the upper, third section, in which the crosses with the bodies of Christ and the two thieves are portrayed, angels are flying about, in deep lamentation, while others are collecting the Saviour’s sacred blood in chalices. In the background on the left, an angular building structure evokes the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. There is a multitude of always meaningful detail, such as the stork above the Holy Cross, piercing its own breast in order to feed its young ones – a symbol of Christ’s sacrifice in order to save Humanity from the original sin.
The Cretan artist Nikolaos Kounelakis studied in St Petersburg but lived and worked in Florence, where he was inspired by the great masters of the Renaissance, such as Raffaello, as well as the neoclassicism of his contemporary French artist Ingres, also related to Florence. Both artists, Raffaello and Ingres, sought to capture the ideal figure.
Zoe Kambani was the artist’s fiancee. She is shown putting her engagement ring around her finger, against a solid dark background, her eyes dreamy, as if lost in tender anticipation of love. An opened love letter on the table with the flower vase is the only additional element in the painting. The girl’s comely face, softly modelled, and her plain blue dress underline the classical character of the work.
“Psyche” (ca. 1880-1882) by the Victorian symbolist painter and sculptor George Frederic
Watts (London 1817 – 1904), is a gift of Alexandros K. Ionidis, a great collector of British society, as was his father, Konstantinos Ionidis-Iplixis, and a personal friend of the artist’s.
Psyche was a beautiful mortal maiden, and the goddess Aphrodite was so envious of her beauty that she sent her son Eros to poison with his arrows all men, preventing them from falling in love with her. Yet, Eros himself fell in love with her and, as Psyche being mortal was not permitted to face an immortal, he led her to a palace where he came to visit her only at night, in the dark, without her ever being able to see him. Yet, Psyche, full of curiosity about her obscure husband, one evening while he was sleeping took a lamp and went to see his face. She was astounded by Eros’s beauty and dropped oil from the lamp on him and woke him up. Angered by her curiosity, he left. In regret, she looked for him everywhere and, after many trials, with the help of Zeus, who made her immortal, reunited with Eros for ever.
In Watt’s work (a different version of the work in the Tate Gallery, inv. no. 1585), the only hints for the story of Psyche are the feather on her foot, the lamp fallen on the ground, and the bed in the background. On the contrary, the idealized “impersonal” slim and tall nude female figure personifies pure divine eros.
Ιn contrast to his Impressionist friends, Fantin-Latour evinced no inclination to work in the open air; he was a painter of the atelier. His early still life works, from the 1860s, were austere depictions of fruit and flowers. He frequently, as in the present painting, placed the table at an oblique angle, cutting off the corners, thus making the image more dynamic and worked it in a way that it was viewed from a slightly elevated angle. In the still life at the National Gallery, which is made up of flowers, most probably pelargoniums (flowers from the geranium family) and summer fruit, the objects are arranged lengthwise along two parallel lines formed in relationship to the table’s far corners; the vase placed behind the fruit is, in reality, the composition’s vertical axis. The white “spots” that represent the flowers, the plates and the sugar are set in contrast to the vivid colors of the fruit, the dark tone of the wood set against the tepid grey background. The melon sliced open and the fully-ripened strawberries arouse the sense of taste while the gleaming cherries, apparently freshly picked, and the sugar, encourage one to sample the fruit. The simplicity of this still life, austere but at the same time provocative, in terms of the sense of taste, is an example of a subtle quest, of an admirable blending of material, painting surface and shadow. The black vase and the table made of wood, with an exceptionally glossy polish, is often seen in this painter’s still life works with fruit and flowers which he did the same year (National Gallery, Washington D.C. and The Metropolitan Museum of New York).
Donated by Aikaterini Rodokanaki in 1907, “Madonna and Child and Saint John the Baptist in a Landscape” could be associated with a series of paintings dating from the late 1620s, painted after Jan Brueghel the Elder’s depictions of the Holy Family in an idyllic wooded landscape. In this painting, we can see the Virgin and Child, accompanied by Saint John the Baptist as a child; seven cupids carry baskets of flowers and fruit (week of 3 September). The scene is set in a heavenly landscape of flowers, trees, small animals (week of 7 September), and birds flying over a river on the left.
As was the case with his father, most of these religious works by Jan Brueghel the Younger were produced with the help of Hendrik van Balen I (Antwerp 1575 – Antwerp 1632), Brueghel’s permanent collaborator, who was tasked with painting the figures in such compositions.
