William Butler Yeats | Non dare mai tutto il tuo cuore / Never give all the heart, 1904

Never give all the heart, for love

Will hardly seem worth thinking of

To passionate women if it seem

Certain, and they never dream

That it fades out from kiss to kiss;

For everything that’s lovely is

But a brief, dreamy, kind delight.

Frida Kahlo | The wounded deer, 1946

Anne Carson - Nobel 2026 | O piccola triste estasi d’amore / O small sad ecstasy of love

Anne Patricia Carson (Toronto, 21 giugno 1950) è una poetessa, saggista, traduttrice e classicista Canadese, insignita del Premio Nobel per la Letteratura 2026.

La diciannovesima donna a vincerlo, su 122 vincitori dal 1901.

È ampiamente considerata una delle voci più originali, audaci ed influenti della letteratura contemporanea globale per la sua capacità di far dialogare il mito classico con la modernità.

Con più di venti libri scritti e tradotti pubblicati fino ad oggi, è stata premiata con le borse di studio Guggenheim e MacArthur, ha vinto il Lannan Literary Award, due Griffin Poetry Prize, il T. S. Eliot Prize, il Premio Principessa delle Asturie, il Governor General's Award per la poesia in lingua inglese ed il Premio PEN/Nabokov, ed è stata nominata membro dell'Ordine del Canada nel 2005 per il suo contributo alla letteratura del Paese.

Anne Patricia Carson

Montserrat Gudiol | La prima donna-membro della Reale Accademia Catalana di Belle Arti

Montserrat Gudiol i Corominas (1933-2015) è stata una pittrice Spagnola di origine catalana, celebre per essere stata una figura pionieristica nell'arte contemporanea della sua regione.

Alcuni dei suoi lavori sembrano ricordare Hieronymus Bosch con un occhiolino allo studio di suo padre, e altri sembrano riflettere le opere di famosi pittori del suo tempo come Picasso.

Figlia dell'architetto e storico dell'arte Josep Gudiol i Ricart, Montserrat si forma inizialmente come autodidatta all'interno dello studio di famiglia specializzato nel restauro di dipinti medievali.

Liu Yi 柳毅, 1958 | Watercolor painter

Liu Yi 柳毅 is an internationally acclaimed contemporary Chinese watercolor master, born in Shanghai in 1958.

He is world-renowned for his extraordinary mastery of the wet-on-wet watercolor technique.

He was a Fine Arts graduate from the Hua Dong University for Education.

He did his postgraduate study of watercolor painting at the China College of Fine Arts.

He lectures at university for painting and design.

Jacques Volpi, 1948 | Expressionist painter

Jacques Volpi is a very famous painter from southern France, of the school of painting cévenole and Provençal.

He is born in the town of Ales in the Gare.

Winner of numerous awards and medals.

He paints by using the technique of the "knife".

The subjects are animated by persons, the colours are lively.

It is famous for his persons in the rain of noon of France.

Oswald Achenbach | Düsseldorf school of painting

Oswald Achenbach (1827-1905) was a German painter associated with the Düsseldorf school of painting.

Though little known today, during his lifetime he was counted among the most important landscape painters of Europe.

Through his teaching activities, he influenced the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf.

His brother, Andreas Achenbach, who was twelve years older, was also among the most important German landscape painters of the 19th century.

The two brothers were humorously called "the A and O of Landscapes" (a reference to their initials matching a common German reference to the Alpha and Omega).

Eliseu Visconti | Impressionist / Art Nouveau painter

Eliseu Visconti (born Eliseo d'Angelo; July 30, 1866 – October 15, 1944) was an Italian-born Brazilian painter, designer, and educator widely celebrated for introducing Impressionism and Art Nouveau to Brazil.

Spanning a highly transitional era between academic traditions and early modernism, he remains one of the most versatile and influential visual artists in Brazilian history.

He entered in 1884 the Liceu de Artes e Ofícios do Rio de Janeiro, where studied under Victor Meireles.

Dang Can, 1957 | Watercolor romantic painter

The Vietnamese painter Đặng Văn Cần was born in An Duc commune, Long Ho District, Vinh Long Province, the place is located along riverside of Mekong river in Vietnam.

He showed an early talent in drawing and painting.

He commenced to art works since 1976 with main job as a illustrator for local newspaper and magazine.

Dang Can is a member of Vietnam Fine Arts Association.

He has many paintings in Private Collection in many countries.

Francesco Gioli | Macchiaioli painter

Francesco Gioli (June 29, 1846 - February 4, 1922) was a prominent Italian painter associated with the Macchiaioli movement and Tuscan Naturalism.

Born into a wealthy family in San Frediano a Settimo (Pisa), he became celebrated for his elegant depictions of rural Tuscan life, atmospheric landscapes and intimate portraits.

Gioli initially trained under academic masters like Antonio Ciseri and Enrico Pollastrini, starting his career with traditional historical paintings.

Wisława Szymborska | Allegro ma non troppo, 1972

Sei bella - dico alla vita,

è impensabile più rigoglio

più rane e più usignoli,

più formiche e più germogli.

Cerco di accattivarmela,

di blandirla, vezzeggiarla.

La saluto sempre per prima

con umile espressione.

Salvador Dalí | Self-portraits

Salvador Dalí started to paint self-portraits very early on.

In the ones made during adolescence, Dalí represents himself with a distant attitude towards his companions, but at the same time wishing to make an impact on them (or to provoke them) and on the public in general.

Like other adolescents, he sought through his appearance an affirmation of his own personality, wearing long hair and sideburns, and dressing extravagantly.

Salvador Dali, 1941 | Soft self-portrait with grilled Bacon

Alfonso Gatto | Il bacio che cerco è l'anima / The kiss I seek is the soul

Le grandi notti d'estate

che nulla muove oltre il chiaro

filtro dei baci, il tuo volto

un sogno nelle mie mani.

Maria Amaral

Tristan Elwell | Fantasy Illustrator

Tristan Elwell is an award-winning American painter, illustrator and educator based in New York.

Best known for his highly detailed oil paintings that blend meticulous traditional techniques with pop-surrealism, fantasy and dark wit, he has created book covers and promotional art for nearly every major commercial publisher.

Tristan Elwell was born and raised in New York City, where he graduated from the High School of Music and Art, now LaGuardia High School.

He attended the School of Visual Arts on a full scholarship, graduating in 1990 at the top of his class.

While at SVA he also worked as a painting assistant to noted photorealist Charles Bell.

Renso Castaneda, 1970 | Figurative painter

Renso Castaneda (born Renso Zevallos Castaneda) is a prominent Peruvian contemporary figurative painter known for his highly detailed oil paintings that blend precise realism with surrealism.

Born in Lima, Peru, his artwork focuses heavily on portraiture and the exploration of the human form, often infusing his subjects with dreamlike, emotional and poetic elements.

Beyond his career as a gallery artist, Castaneda is highly active in international art education, teaching fine art techniques to global audiences online.

Graduated from the National Autonomous Superior School of Fine Arts of Peru, where he studied painting from 1989 to 1995.

Eva Antonini, 1961 | Figurative sculptor

Eva Antonini was born in Rapperswil-Switzerland, the place of her childhood and adolescence.

As a young girl, Eva reveals a natural proneness for molding clay, matter that later will be privileged in the creation of sculptures of medium and large dimensions.

From 1981-1985 she lives in Geneva, where she takes her first steps in the working world, following her diverse and complex education: language studies; singing, music and dance; a horizon of journeys, stays in England, Italy and United States with stops in the Middle and Far East.

Nadežda Petrović | Expressionist / Fauve painter

Nadežda Petrović / Надежда Петровић (1873-1915) was a Serbian painter and one of the women war photography pioneers in the region.

Considered Serbia's most famous Expressionist and Fauvist, she was the most important Serbian female painter of the period.

Born in the town of Čačak, Petrović moved to Belgrade in her youth and attended the women's school of higher education there.

In 1893, she became an art teacher at the school and later taught at the women's university in Belgrade.

Kay Ruane, 1956 | Symbolist painter

Kay Ruane is a contemporary American visual artist widely recognized for her intricate, highly detailed graphite drawings.

Currently based in Los Angeles, her meticulously rendered graphite-on-board and graphite-on-paper worlds often explore themes of human existence, isolation, intimacy and the cultural disconnect between interior spaces and the outside world.

Education: Earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) in Studio Arts from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and advanced her artistic training at Indiana State University and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Haixia Liu, 1962 | Impressionist painter

Haixia Liu is a highly successful Chinese-American contemporary painter born to a family of artists in the Hubei Province of China.

He is celebrated for his vibrant, textured oil paintings that merge realistic details with dreamy contemporary impressionism.

Encouraged and instructed by his father and grandfather, he began to draw at very early age.

He did decorative painting for local businesses at age 12.

Between 1981-1983 Liu chose to learn graphic design at the Hubei Industry Institute.

Deidre But-Husaim, 1959

Deidre But-Husaim is an accomplished Australian contemporary realist painter based in Adelaide, South Australia.

Oil painting sits at the absolute core of her figurative and portraiture practice, which explores the deep tension between public identity and the private self.

Deidre But-Husaim attended Adelaide Central School of Art and Adelaide Centre for the Arts.

She paints with oil on canvas (linen), her work is mostly figurative.

Ignacio Larra, 1954 | Symbolist painter

Ignacio Larra is a renowned Spanish figurative and mural painter born in Caracas, Venezuela.

At age 14, he relocated to Spain with his parents, where his father -the celebrated landscape artist Juan Larramendi- became his primary artistic mentor.

Larra's distinct style, known for its deep symbolism, intimacy and meticulous attention to fine detail, was heavily shaped by his time spent in Amsterdam studying classical Flemish and Dutch painting.

His father recognized his early talent for painting figures and portraits, guiding his transition into fine oil painting.