Agnolo Bronzino | Hands

Agnolo di Cosimo (1503-1572), usually known as Bronzino or Agnolo Bronzino, was an Italian Mannerist painter from Florence.

His sobriquet, Bronzino, may refer to his relatively dark skin or reddish hair.

He lived all his life in Florence, and from his late 30s was kept busy as the court painter of Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany.

He was mainly a portraitist but also painted many religious subjects, and a few allegorical subjects, which include what is probably his best known work, Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time, c. 1544-45, now in London.

Diego Rivera | Social Realist painter / muralist

Considered the greatest Mexican painter of the twentieth century, Diego Rivera (1886-1957) had a profound effect on the international art world.

Among his many contributions, Rivera is credited with the reintroduction of fresco painting into modern art and architecture.

His radical political views and tempestuous romance with the painter Frida Kahlo were then, and remain today, a source of public intrigue.

Giovanni Battista Tiepolo | Vita ed opere

Tièpolo, Giambattista - Pittore (Venezia 1696 - Madrid 1770), tra i massimi esponenti del rococò e ultimo grande protagonista della decorazione monumentale in Europa.

Tièpolo lavorò in Italia e all'estero, lasciando numerose opere, nelle quali, sempre aggiornato sulle ultime tendenze artistiche, mostra una stupefacente capacità di assorbire con naturalezza le intonazioni stilistiche dai più differenti pittori, rielaborandole poi con la propria sensibilità e una tecnica rapida.

Grazie a lui la tradizione decorativa veneziana tornò a imporsi sulla scena artistica del suo tempo.

Tra le opere più significative dell'evoluzione della sua arte vi sono gli affreschi del palazzo arcivescovile di Udine (1726-30), le tele per la Scuola del Carmine a Venezia (1743), uno dei suoi capolavori, e gli affreschi per la residenza di Carlo Filippo di Greiffenklau a Würzburg (1751-53).

Federico del Campo (1837-1923) | Vedute painter

Federico del Campo was a Peruvian painter who was active in Venice where he was one of the leading vedute painters of the 19th century.

Del Campo was born in Lima and left his native Peru at a young age.

Nothing is known with certainty about his early studies in Peru.

He studied at Madrid's Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando (Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando) in Madrid from around 1865. Here he established a friendship with Lorenzo Valles, a history painter.

Emily Dickinson | Tutto imparammo dell'amore / We learned the Whole of Love

Tutto imparammo dell'amore

Alfabeto, parole.

Il capitolo, il libro possente

Poi la rivelazione terminò.

Ma negli occhi dell'altro

Ciascuno contemplava l'ignoranza

Divina, ancora più che nell'infanzia:

L'uno all'altro, fanciulli.

Camille Claudel 1864-1943

Renoir | Landscapes with Figures

• "If you paint the leaf on a tree without using a model, your imagination will only supply you with a few leaves; but Nature offers you millions, all on the same tree. No two leaves are exactly the same. The artist who paints only what is in his mind must very soon repeat himself" - Pierre-Auguste Renoir.
• "Se dipingi la foglia su un albero senza usare un modello, la tua immaginazione ti fornirà solo poche foglie; ma la natura ti offre milioni, tutti sullo stesso albero. Non ci sono due foglie esattamente uguali. L'artista che dipinge solo ciò che ha in mente deve ben presto ripetersi" - Pierre-Auguste Renoir.

Leo Tolstoy: "Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself"

Ilia Efimovich Repin (Ukrainian-born Russian Realist painter, 1844-1930)| Portrait of Leo Tolstoy, 1887

Best known for his two classic novels, 'War and Peace' and 'Anna Karenina' Leo Tolstoy, in full Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy / Лев Никола́евич Толсто́й (1828-1910), was a Russian writer, a master of realistic fiction and one of the world’s greatest novelists.

• "Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself".

• "Tutti pensano a cambiare il mondo, ma nessuno pensa a cambiare se stesso".

• "All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way".

• "Tutte le famiglie felici si assomigliano fra loro, ogni famiglia infelice è infelice a suo modo".

• "If you look for perfection, you'll never be content".

• "Se cerchi la perfezione, non ti accontenterai mai".