An abstracted painting of a roughly oval-shaped jack-in-the-pulpit flower fills this vertical composition with cool, saturated blues, grays, and greens. A royal-blue elongated, rounded core at the bottom center is surrounded by a pale gray flame-like shape. Petals flare outward and up around the core to reach toward the sides and top of the canvas. A thin white line extends upward from the top center of the core to meet the pointed tip of the unfurling, innermost midnight-blue petal. Layers of green, reminiscent of leaves, curl outward around the top half of the flower. Pale blue in each of the four corners creates the impression of a background behind the flower, and fades to white at the top corners.
Georgia O'Keeffe, Jack-in-the-Pulpit No. IV, 1930, oil on canvas, Alfred Stieglitz Collection, Bequest of Georgia O'Keeffe, 1987.58.3

Flowers

A bounty of bouquets can be found in art. Flowers have inspired artists from Vincent van Gogh to Alma Thomas. Eighteenth-century Dutch artist Jan van Huysum painted lavish floral still lifes, while modern painters like Georgia O’Keeffe created far more abstract flowers. Not only are these floral forms beautiful but they also often have symbolic meaning. 

  • A bouquet of cut flowers in a clear glass vase nearly fills this vertical painting. The vase has straight sides and the rounded bottom is supported by short, round feet. Some of the flowers can be identified as white roses and carnations but other less defined flowers are executed in quick touches of delphinium blue, marigold orange, brick red, and butter yellow. Green stalks and leaves are interspersed throughout, and green stems fill the vase. Some of the flowers and vegetation are thickly painted, and these contrast with other areas where the paint is more thinly applied. The bouquet is set against a pale gray background, and the vase casts a subtle blue shadow to our right. The artist signed the painting in gray letters at the lower right: “Manet.”
  • A tall arrangement of blue irises, cream-white carnations, violets, peonies, tulips, and other azure-blue, white, and scarlet-red flowers in a terracotta urn carved with child-like putti takes up most of the space of this vertical still life painting. The arrangement is warmly lit from the upper left and sits near a corner of a stone ledge veined in caramel brown and golden yellow. The ledge extends off the right edge of the painting. Most of the flowers face us but some face away or droop down. Leggy tulips in full bloom rise high in the bouquet. A cluster of white peonies veined lightly with pale pink are gathered near a crimson-edged white carnation and vivid blue forget-me-nots near the center, above the urn. The stems and blossoms of other flowers swirl and twist through the arrangement. A small brown and orange butterfly with black spots perches with wings slightly open on a scarlet-red poppy at the top center. Another butterfly sits with wings spread near the front corner of the ledge. Black circles surrounded by rings that blend from sapphire blue to butter yellow look like eyes at the tips of each of the four wings. A third butterfly with white wings is partly visible behind the petals of a ruby-red peony in the lower right. A small bird’s nest woven with twigs and green moss sits to our right of the urn, and is filled with four blue eggs. The background behind the arrangement is streaked with sable brown and mustard yellow. The signature of the artist is written in cursive on the face of the stone ledge near the corner, “Jan Van Huysum fecit.”
  • An abstracted painting of a roughly oval-shaped jack-in-the-pulpit flower fills this vertical composition with cool, saturated blues, grays, and greens. A royal-blue elongated, rounded core at the bottom center is surrounded by a pale gray flame-like shape. Petals flare outward and up around the core to reach toward the sides and top of the canvas. A thin white line extends upward from the top center of the core to meet the pointed tip of the unfurling, innermost midnight-blue petal. Layers of green, reminiscent of leaves, curl outward around the top half of the flower. Pale blue in each of the four corners creates the impression of a background behind the flower, and fades to white at the top corners.
  • A cloud of canary-yellow flowers with pumpkin-orange centers on tall stems with emerald and pine-green leaves fills the top half of this vertical still life painting. The flowers, vase, the round tabletop on which they sit, and the background are loosely painted with visible brushstrokes of vibrant color. The flowers have long, pointed petals like daisies. The bouquet is rimmed with a ring of verdant leaves near where the stems gather in the narrow neck of the cylindrical, ivory-white vase. The vase might sit on a circular cloth edged with alternating sage-green and plum-purple forms like pompoms, but the loose painting style makes these details difficult to make out. The round tabletop is cropped by left and bottom edges of the canvas. The background behind the bouquet and table is painted with long, vertical brushstrokes in salmon pink, pale turquoise, denim blue, and creamy white. The artist signed and dated the painting in red in the lower right corner: “Claude Monet 1880.”
  • A profusion of white roses bursting from the neck of a tan jug almost fills the height of this horizontal still life painting. The roses have large, round blooms with petals tinged with denim and aquamarine blue, sage green, mauve pink, teal, and butter yellow. Emerald-green leaves fill the spaces between blossoms. The jug has a short, rounded handle and sits on a sea glass-green surface. A few blooms lie in the lower left corner and at the foot of the vessel. Many of the flowers, leaves, and vase are outlined with navy blue or black. A mint-green wall with wavy, diagonal streaks of cream white fills the background. The paint is applied thickly with visible strokes.

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Verdant green fields roll in undulating waves back alongside a road in this horizontal landscape painting. The fields take up the left and center of the composition and are painted with thick, curling strokes of emerald, pea, and celery green, and corn yellow to suggest grasses and plants. The pale green road runs up along the right edge of the painting, and is layered with strokes and daubs in butter yellow, spring green, and faint blue. The fields and road meet the horizon line about halfway up the canvas, where an aquamarine-blue sky swirling with white and periwinkle-blue clouds fills the top half of the painting.

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Scarlet-red dashes create loose vertical lines against a bright white background that fill this vertical abstract painting. Most of the dashes are vertical but some slant at an angle. The artist signed and dated the work with white paint in the lower right corner, “AWT 73.”

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Three men on horseback wearing elaborate military uniforms in cream white, crimson red, and gold almost fill this vertical painting. Lit dramatically from the upper left, the men all have peachy, tanned skin. Their red and white uniforms are trimmed liberally with gold. Each man wears a red sash across his chest, cream-white gloves that reach back to mid-forearm, and a tall hat topped with a single, stiff, white feather. At the center of the composition, the man closest to us rides a horse dappled with silver, steel gray, and black, which raises a front hoof as if in mid-stride. The horse and rider’s bodies are angled to our right, but the horse looks back to our left as the man looks directly at us with small brown eyes. His slender nose slopes to a brown handlebar moustache that curves over his pale peach mouth. He leans slightly back in the saddle, which is draped with a scarlet-red blanket with gold trim. The leg we see, to our left, is extended straight in the stirrup, and the man braces a brass trumpet adorned with gold tassels against that thigh. His helmet has a high, square, white crown that comes to points to each side and in front. The boxy shape is outlined in red and has the stiff, bushy feather at the top front and a red tassel hanging along one side. An arched brass plaque with a capital N is affixed to the front of the helmet over a narrow brim. Though held in place with a chin strap, the helmet is slightly askew. To our left and behind the central man, a white horse and rider face away from us. This rider’s upper body is turned back slightly to our right so we see him in profile as he holds a brass horn to his lips. To our right and set father back, the third rider and his gray horse are very loosely painted so features of his face and costume are not clear. All three stand on a ground painted with swipes of caramel brown, mustard yellow, and pine green. The background is slightly darker, in smoky tones of brown, gray, and black with flicks of red. A dark mass, perhaps a deep shadow, rises to the right, behind the third horseman.

Romanticism

Romanticists, who placed emotion and intuition before reason, caused a re-evaluation of the role of art and the artist. They believed in the importance of the individual, the personal, and the subjective. This late-18th and early-19th century movement was a backlash to the ideals of rationality that had remained central since the Renaissance.

Shown from the shoulders up, a woman and man, both with brown skin, look at each other in this horizontal portrait painting. Their bodies are angled toward each other and both have black hair, dark eyebrows, and full, coral-red lips. To our left, the woman faces our right in profile. She has a delicate nose and high cheekbones. Her eyes are painted with black lashes over black eyes, without the white of the eye. A gold disk earring hangs from the ear we can see, and she wears white and royal-blue beads in two necklaces. Her hair is combed or styled close to her head, and a swath of brick-red fabric, flecked with golden yellow, wraps around the back of her neck. A scarf with butter-yellow, denim-blue, and red stripes in a plaid pattern is draped across her shoulders, over a rose-pink garment. To our right, the man’s face is angled toward the woman but we see both eyes and the far cheek. His hair is closely cropped and he has a rounded nose, curving brows, and full cheeks. The shadows and folds of his white garment are painted with streaks of teal blue. The background behind the pair is patterned with bands and geometric designs of mustard yellow, scarlet red, and teal, with some stylized leaves in emerald and forest green. The artist signed the work in red paint in the lower right corner, “Lois M. Jones.”

Love

From blossoming romances to painful heartbreaks or lifelong connections, artists capture all stages of love. This most universal human emotion has inspired countless moving works of art.