Artists' Most Famous Paintings - Part 1

For often inexplicable reasons, some famous artists who painted many outstanding works have a most-famous painting. One that stands out from the rest, not necessarily in terms of excellence.

Just for fun, this post and a following one present some of those famous paintings that come to my mind.

The artists featured here, in alphabetical order, are Gustave Caillebotte (1848-1894), Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, 1st Marquess of Dalí de Púbol, best known as Salvador Dalí (1904-1989), Edward Hopper (1882-1967), Gustav Klimt (1862-1918), and Edvard Munch (1863-1944).

Gallery

Paris Street on a Rainy Day - 1877 - by Caillebotte
Maybe it has to do with the daring vertical split at the middle. Or perhaps the mood depicted. Then again, it could be the slightly simplified details that provide a slightly poster-like impression for modern eyes. Let's just say it might be all three possibilities along with a few more intangibles.

The Persistence of Memory - 1931 - by Dalí
My guess is that it was the melting watches and that this was a fairly early Surrealist work by Dalí that generated initial notoriety. The fact that it's part of the New York Museum of Modern Art's collection and usually is on view contributes to its fame. Regardless, when I think of Dalí paintings, this one often comes to mind.

Nighthawks - 1942 - by Hopper
I chalk this painting's fame to the scene being depicted with its contrasts and psychological overtones.  It can make viewers wonder what might have been happening there besides the obvious.

The Kiss - 1908 - by Klimt
All that gilt, the ornamental detailing, the general abstraction of the composition.  But the keys are the in-contrast depictions of fragments of people and the subject action.

The Scream - 1893 - by Munch
It happens that I dislike this painting. As best I can tell, its fame has to do with the popularity of Freudian psychology decades ago and linkages people can make between the two.

Bernard Hailstone, Postwar Portraits

Bernard Hailstone (1910-1987) was essentially a portrait artist whose works from around 1945 and later either contain the very slightest wisp of Modernism or else aren't top-notch depictions in many instances. I don't think much of them. But perhaps you might, hence this post.

His Wikipedia entry is here.

Hailstone painted royalty and other prominent Britons, though his portraits of Royals were for entities with which they were associated, and not the royal collection. Some of his portraits of senior military officers are in the Imperial War Museum collection, as he was a war artist sent as far as Burma.

Gallery

Charles, Prince of Wales - 1977

Princess Anne - c. 1979

Prince Andrew - 1980

Admiral Lord Louis Montbatten

Sir Winston Churchill, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports - 1955

Lieutenant General Sir Miles Dempsey - 1946
Dempsey, later promoted to General, was one of the best British generals in World War 2.

Air Chief Marshal Sir Keith Park - c. 1946
Park and Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding were the key Royal Air Force commanders during the Battle of Britain. These portraits of Dempsey and Park are decent likenesses, but I find Hailstone's brushwork detracts from what they might have been.

Sir John Barbirolli - 1964
Orchestra conductor.

Sam Johnson, DCM, Docker - 1943
Hailstone made many paintings of dock workers, merchant seamen and such during the early years of the war. This strikes me as a better painting than most of those above.

Portrait of a girl
A pleasing oil sketch, though her forehead seems a bit off. Ditto her hairdo.

Loading Aeroplane Parts for Overseas - c.1943
An example of his wartime non-portrait work.

Leonard Campbell Taylor: Ladies with Puffy Skirts and Other Paintings

Leonard Campbell Taylor (1874-1969) was a member of the Royal Academy who painted in a somewhat painstaking representational style that was going out of fashion even as his career was starting. His Wikipedia entry is here.

Below are examples of his paintings up into the early 1930s. Most feature women and interiors. Not included here are his landscape paintings and illustrations made while serving as a war artist during the Great War. I haven't found examples dated from 1935 to his death, so I do not know if he ever adjusted his style to suit changing artistic fashions.

Gallery

Meditation - 1899

Patience - 1906

The Rain it Raineth Every Day - 1906

Japanese Prints, or The Portfolio - c.1907

Summer Afternoon (An Interior, Lord Birkenhead Seated) - 1913

Chess

Romsey Abbey

The Hall

Queen Mary - 1928

The Sampler - 1931-32
At this date, he seems to have decided to use retro subject matter along with retro style.

Restaurant Car - (London, Midland and Scottish Railway poster artwork) - c.1935
Judging by the woman's clothing, I think this was painted in the late 1920s or 1930, and not the date found on the Internet with the image.

Stanley Cursiter's Early 1920s Women

Stanley Cursiter (1887-1976) was a Scottish painter who was Keeper of the National Galleries of Scotland from 1930 until 1948. I wrote about him here, and his Wikipedia entry is here.

During the first half of the 1920s he painted several works featuring attractive young women, especially one named Poppy Low.

Gallery

Black, White and Silver - 1921

Roberta - c. 1922
She might also be the subject of the previous painting.

Poppy Low - 1922

A Summer Night - 1923
The model is Poppy Low.

The Fair Isle Jumper - 1923

The Seamstress - 1923

House of Cards - 1924

Artist, Self Portrait, with his wife Phyllis Eda Hourston, and his model Poppy Low, Chez Nous - 1925

Apple Green - 1925
The appears to be Poppy.

Reclining Lady
Undated: This might be his wife.

Thomas Wilmer Dewing's Women with Musical Instruments

Thomas Wilmer Dewing (1851-1938) -- Wikipedia entry here -- painted many gauzy, dreamy images of women in a style so distinctive that it would be difficult for another artist to mimic it in order to carve out a successful career.

I rather like his work and am always pleased when I stumble across one of his paintings in a museum.

The settings Dewing chose varied.  Below are examples of women shown with musical instruments -- one of his major themes.  They are arranged in approximate chronological order.

Gallery

Lady with a Lute - 1886
This was before he settled on his gauzy style.

The Piano - 1891
This is clearly mainline Dewing.  Note the lack of a realistic background.

Music - c. 1895
Here he combines two of his themes -- a woman with a musical instrument and women in a outdoor setting.

The Spinet - c. 1902
This is more hard-edge than usual.

The Lute - 1903
Also painted more crisply.  Perhaps he was considering backing away from his signature style at this time.

Brocart de Venise - c. 1904
Now Dewing drifts back to fuzzy, nondescript backgrounds.

The Song and the Cello - c. 1910
In his outdoor scenes Dewing often had his women as small elements of the overall painting.  Here he tries it in an indoors setting.

Young Woman with Violincello - c. 1912
This is the latest (approximately) dated image of this set.

La musicienne

Lady with a Cello
These two paintings did not have dates associated with them.  However, they were likely made in the early 1900s.

William McCance, Scottish Modernist

William McCance (1894–1970), according to his Wikipedia entry, is noteworthy for the following:

"McCance's paintings in the 1920s were unusual in that he was one of the few Scottish artists who embraced the cubist, abstract and machine-inspired arts movements that spread across Europe following the First World War."

That said, my judgment is that he was a journeyman modernist who did little more than follow Modernist stylistic practices as they changed over time. Perhaps you will disagree. My case is stated in the following images.

Gallery

Self-Portrait - 1916
He was about 22 years old and perhaps completing his art studies.

Kimono Study (wife Agnes) - 1919
Modernist background, but otherwise conventional.

Conflict - 1922
Now he is full-bore Modernist.

Woman Reading - 1922
Probably his wife.

Agnes Miller Parker (study of his wife)
She too was an artist.

Mediterranean Hill Town - 1923

Joseph Brewer - 1925

Pendulum Clock - 1926
A dip into Cubism/Futurism.

The Result
... of a sports event?  An election?

Seated Figure (Lucy) - 1929

Improvised Seated Figure - 1955

Missile Antimissile Antimissile - 1965
A late creation.  McCance was a pacifist and jailed for that during the Great War.