Reading The Story of Art by Ernst Gombrich - a wondrous 1950 book widely regarded as a seminal work of criticism and that I wholeheartedly recommend to anyone - I found myself wondering, after all these years, what is my very favorite painting of all time. Try to choose one and only one is a nearly impossible mission, isn't it? So I ask help to you: post an image of your favorite picture and explain - briefly - what are the feelings that it sends to you. In other words, why it is your Favorite Painting of All Time. "There is, really, no such thing as art. There are only artists." (Ernst Gombrich)
Pure trippiness awesomeness. I've always felt it means something about the foolishness of the idea we call "time." Sorry I'm not that good at this. But hands down my favorite picture. Seeing it at MOMA was an experience I'll never forget.
Boom! Haha! You almost immediately hit the target, my friend, because DalĂ is one of my very favorite artists and The Persistence of Memory is in my absolute Top Ten. I've even a reproduction of it in my living room. I simply love it. Thank you.
Michelangelo- Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. I was awestruck when I saw this in 1998. Magnificent, a monumental achievement.
This is a good question but it's so hard! I've liked JW Waterhouse's stuff since my teenage years, there's Godward's "Tambourine Girl" and Frederick Alma Tadema's bright white and blue classic Greek scenes also come to mind. For my favorite though, it's Caspar David Friedrich's "Wanderer Above The Sea Of Fog". Hard for me to describe why-isolation, but also arrival and exaltation above the lower elements. Beyond that, well, words fail.
What else it's possible to say about it? My only regret - although I live relatively near to it - I saw it only once, and many years ago. Beauty is never trite.
I'm glad to know someone else sees it this way. I often get the response that it is very unoriginal to name The Starry Night as a favorite painting. I have several different prints that I've picked up through the years. Another personal favorite...
Las Meninas by Diego Velazquez. I have an 8x1o pinned to the wall immediately to my left where I can see it every single day while I'm working. Neapolitan painter Luca Giordano called it the "theology of painting," and its complex structure and composition are, I think, valuable lessons for any visual artist. More here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Las_Meninas
Oh, well, I always hated the "fake revolutionaries" or "the original ones at all costs" and, after all these years, I am getting closer and closer to zero tolerance. It's too easy. My older brother thought to be smart saying "the Mona Lisa is not, after all, that great masterpiece that is considered." Oh, yes... The Starry Night is - needless to say - wonderful. Perhaps - and I underline perhaps - my favorite Van Gogh is Wheatfield with Crows, which is believed as his last painting.
It's not my favorite but does anyone else like The Arnolfini Wedding? The centre and for me focus of it seems to lie not just in the people but in the mirror.
Here I am. Some time ago I even wrote an article for a local newspaper about Jan van Eyck, because there was an exhibition in town. Yes, The Arnolfini Wedding is one of his most famous work and it has a mysterious reputation, that numerous studies and unresolved questions fed. The mirror, for the first time, as far as we know, show the background of the painting.