amagnasco Monks at Supper, oil on canvas.

305 years ago

mjheade Magnolias on Light Blue Velvet Cloth, oil on canvas. This painting dates from the later part of Martin Johnson Heade’s long, varied, and peripatetic career. After traveling through the United States, to England and continental Europe, and three different times to Brazil, Heade settled in Saint Augustine, Florida, at the age of 64. There he began painting detailed arrangements of native flowers, including the Cherokee rose, orange blossom, and, as in this work, magnolia.

135 years ago

plabruzzi Portrait of the Architect Giuseppe Valadier, oil on canvas.

230 years ago

jccazin Tobias and the Angel, oil on canvas.

147 years ago

lfeininger Manhattan Dawn, oil on canvas.

81 years ago

pgauguin Te raau rahi (The Big Tree), oil on jute canvas. “Everything in the landscape blinded and dazzled me,” wrote Paul Gauguin of his first months in Tahiti. Here, he showcased the island’s variety of bountiful fruit trees, including a thick-trunked, violet hotu at left; spindly mango and coconut trees; and three short banana plants with lush, splayed leaves. In the foreground, a man uses a stick to crack a coconut, and a family rests in the grass with a sleeping dog beside them.

134 years ago

aelsheimer Saint John the Baptist in the Wilderness, oil on copper. Adam Elsheimer created imaginary, highly composed landscapes in small paintings on copper. Traveling to Rome in 1600, he was inspired by the city's monuments and artistic environment. In this work, the youthful saint echoes ancient Greek and Roman sculpture while the wooded landscape is indebted to Northern European painting. Though Elsheimer died in Rome at a young age, his painting influenced his fellow artists, including Peter Paul Rubens.

420 years ago

bschool Family in a Room, oil on canvas.

260 years ago

mchagall The Circus Rider, oil on canvas.

98 years ago

wojcvoostsanen Saint Peter and a Donor (recto); Saint Thomas (verso), oil on panel.

505 years ago

smorita Dragon Knows Dragon (Ryu wa ryu wo shiru), four-panel screen; aluminum flake pigment in polyvinyl acetate medium, yellow alkyd varnish, on paper.

56 years ago