This scene is inspired by the landscape along the lower Rhine. Cuyp used the warm Italian sunlight he had adopted from his colleagues who specialised in Italianate landscapes. It is an important work of Cuyp's maturity & was probably painted around 1655 ...

The seated man in the centre wearing the Cross of the Order of Santiago, was formerly thought to be intended as a portrait of Velàzquez writing, possibly in connection with his court duties. It has recently been proposed more convincingly that this painting is a portrait sketch of the Count of Santisteban with his daughter. The Count was Viceroy of Naples between 1687 & 1695. Giordano probably painted this picture when he was in Spain. The significance of the composition is unclear: Giordano, who depicts himself as the figure in the lower right, seems either to point out the scene in the upper portion of the picture or else to be indicating that it is painted by himself. ...

This scene shows a horse (a white horse, characteristic of Wouwermans) being shod outside a village smithy. In the right foreground is a grinding stone. This work is thought to have been painted early in Wouwermans's career, probably in the 1640s. Wouwerma ...

Create your own bespoke print of Jean-Louis-André-Théodore Géricault’s A Horse frightened by Lightning from our collection. About this painting A Horse frightened by Lightning, about 1813-14 © The National Gallery, London This painting joined our collection in 1938 With our custom print service, you can order your own fully customised reproduction from the National Gallery Collection & exhibitions. Choose your own size, print material & frames & have your masterpiece delivered straight to your door. ...

This work was formerly attributed to a follower of Giorgione but is more probably by Bonifazio or his studio. It has been suggested that this work may derive from a series representing the ' Labours of the Months'. ...

In the Middle Ages, the Old Testament prophecy that the Messiah would spring from the family of Jesse, the father of David, was interpreted visually as a genealogical tree. Here, typically, Jesse reclines at the base of the tree which issues from his loins ...

The sitter wears the cross of the military order of S. Stefano, founded in Pisa in 1561 by the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Cosimo I de' Medici. The letters & inkstand on the table, & the books & statue above, allude to his status & learned interests. Independent life-size & full-length portraits are very rare in Tuscan 16th-century art. The painting has been attributed to Alessandro Allori, successor to Bronzino as painter to the Medici Court, but it is closer in style to the work of Maso da San Friano (Tommaso Manzuoli, 1531
- 1571).
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This portrait of a knight of Saint John, identifiable by the eight-pointed cross around his neck, has been newly attributed to Polidoro. It was probably painted when the Order of Saint John was temporarily resident in Messina, Sicily, having been expelled from Rhodes. Polidoro trained with Raphael in Rome but moved to Messina in 1528. Franciabigio also depicted a member of the Order in his Portrait of a Knight of Rhodes. ...

The portrait is an early work by Moroni, probably of the later 1550s, & from the Avogadro collection in Brescia. The soldier represented is probably one of the sons of Gerolamo Avogadro, the likely sitter in Moretto's full-length portrait of 1526, which is in the National Gallery Collection (' Portrait of Man'). As in other early Moroni portraits the ruined setting may be intended to highlight the endurance of the virtues which the sitter represents. Moroni makes little outward attempt to idealise his subject, who is shown as a relatively frail figure against a background of crumbling architecture & with armour laid out at his feet. A helmet decorated with festive plumes is given prominence on the ledge to the right. A brace on the soldier's left leg, the 'piede ferito' (wounded foot) that gives the painting its popular title, may indicate a wound sustained in a battle or a joust, or a congenital deformity. ...

Before he devoted himself exclusively to portraiture, Netscher painted a number of genre scenes. His indebtedness to his master, Gerard ter Borch, can be seen in the careful depiction of texture, in this case of the fur & satin of the woman's rich cloth ...