Guernica, 1937 by Pablo Picasso

During the war, Picasso was visited by Nazi Ambassador Otto Abetz in his Parisian studio.

The latter came upon a picture of Guernica, which had been sent to New York by the painter as soon as the Exhibition was over.

He asked: "Did you really do this?" to which Picasso answered: "No, You did".

Guernica is Pablo Picasso's monumental 1937 oil painting that stands as one of the most powerful and famous anti-war statements in history.

Painted in response to the bombing of the Basque town of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War, the artwork captures the universal suffering and brutality of conflict through its chaotic imagery and stark monochrome palette.

Audrey Hepburn: "Paris is always a good idea!"

• "I love the night passionately.

I love it as I love my country, or my mistress, with an instinctive, deep, and unshakeable love.

I love it with all my senses: I love to see it, I love to breathe it in, I love to open my ears to its silence, I love my whole body to be caressed by its blackness.

Skylarks sing in the sunshine, the blue sky, the warm air, in the fresh morning light.

The owl flies by night, a dark shadow passing through the darkness; he hoots his sinister, quivering hoot, as though he delights in the intoxicating black immensity of space" - Guy de Maupassant

Claude Monet | Legacy

Speaking of Monet's body of work, Wildenstein said that it is "so extensive that its very ambition and diversity challenges our understanding of its importance".

His paintings produced at Giverny and under the influence of cataracts have been said to create a link between Impressionism and twentieth-century art and modern abstract art, respectively.

His later works were a "major" inspiration to Objective abstraction.

Claude Monet | Nymphéas / Water Lilies

Water Lilies / Nymphéas is a series of approximately 250 oil paintings by French Impressionist Claude Monet (1840-1926).

The paintings depict Monet's flower garden at his home in Giverny, and were the main focus of Monet's artistic production during the last thirty years of his life.

Many of the works were painted while Monet suffered from cataracts.

Félix Vallotton | Figures and Portraits

Félix Edouard Vallotton (1865-1925) was a Swiss /French painter and printmaker associated with Les Nabis.

Vallotton was recognized as a very accomplished portrait painter, and painted portraits of many of the leading figures in the arts of his time.

His early work included a portrait of his fellow Nabi Édouard Vuillard.

The portraits of Vallotton featured both precision and a certain cold realism.