wrmthorne/National_Gallery_style_classification huggingface dataset:
A shaft of light from the low sun seems to point the way forward for the ox cart between the craggy cliffs. Long-haired goats chew on the brittle leaves of scrubby plants, but there's lush greenery on the distant hillside above the lake.

The cart is laden with household goods resting on straw, suggesting either that the driver is moving house or that he’s a travelling trader, people who hawked their wares throughout the countryside. They would have been rare but welcome visitors in remote areas, such as the one Jan Both portrays here -- perhaps explaining the interest of the man in the white tunic.

After a climb up the steep path from the lake below, the squeak of wheels and the creak of the loaded cart cease for a moment. The oxen are given a moment’s pause while the driver turns to two goatherds. Judging by his open mouth, he's shouting -- but he doesn’t disturb the men or the tranquillity of the idyllic landscape. In the background, ancient towers overlook the waters of a stream rippling against rocky banks and the deep forest rises up steeply towards a cloudy sky.

Behind the ox cart, two horsemen take a different route. Horses are uncommon in Both’s painting of the Italian countryside, and so is one of the riders. Led by a groom on foot, he’s richly dressed and has another rider, less grand, behind him, probably a servant. Both’s rural characters usually ride mules and represent the hard life of a peasant both in Italy and in his own country, the Dutch Republic.

This picture of a rocky, inhospitable scene is painted with great attention to detail and in the soft colours that Both favoured. If lit with the cold northern light of the Dutch Republic the landscape might be grim and forbidding, but Both's warm lighting turns it into a rustic delight that would appeal to a Dutch merchant living in a busy city.

During Both's three year stay in Rome he befriended Claude, the great French landscape painter. Claude's style influenced the young Both, which can be seen in this picture: a gold evening or early morning light, deep shadow in the foreground and a misty distance, hidden castles and towers, and slender birch trees with a fine tracery of leaves against the sky.

Both differed from Claude in the portrayal of characters. Claude almost always took a mythical or biblical incident, placing idealised figures in the scene but featuring the landscape more prominently. Jan Both occasionally did the same, but he preferred the realism of recognisable contemporary people doing familiar, and sometimes amusing, things.

Style: Baroque
Christ, barefoot and weeping but dressed in rich red and blue, is bent under the weight of the Cross. The spikes of the crown of thorns dig into his flesh, and crystal tears drip down his cheeks. He is on the road to Calvary and is dragging the Cross to his own crucifixion.

The way to Calvary was a hugely popular subject in the later Middle Ages and Renaissance, when Christians were encouraged to empathise with Christ's suffering at the Passion. It appears in several paintings in the National Gallery's collection, from Ugolino di Nerio's version to one by Jacopo Bassano.

This is one of a pair of small panels painted by the Milanese artist Ambrogio Bergognone. An inscription in the bottom left corner of this panel includes the date 1501. Bergognone was very fond of lettering done in mordant gilding (where gold leaf is applied over a glue) -- it appears in many of his paintings, such as The Virgin and Child with Saint Catherine of Alexandria and Saint Catherine of Siena and The Virgin and Child. Here Christ's halo is inscribed in Latin, 'Hail Jesus of Nazareth'; the letters on his robes are merely decoration.

Although these are biblical events, the setting is not first-century Palestine -- it is Renaissance Italy. The path leads between grassy banks dotted with flowers, and in the background is a walled town on the edge of a river or lake. It is clearly a fine day: the skies are blue, people stroll on the path by the water and washing has been hung to dry over the balcony. Like many Renaissance artists, Bergognone often showed sacred stories in contemporary settings that would be familiar to his audience: for Renaissance Christians, the Bible was here and now, not ancient history.

Style: High Renaissance
Helen or Helena was mother of the first Christian emperor, Constantine. She dreamed that an angel revealed to her the location of the cross on which Christ was crucified and urged her to travel to the Holy Land to find it. She excavated three crosses and, by testing their healing power, was able to identify which was Christ's cross, known as the True Cross.

In Veronese's painting, Saint Helena sits with one foot up on a stone bench in a window alcove, her head resting in her hand, her elbow on the window ledge. As she sleeps, two winged cherubs appear as a vision in the sky carrying the True Cross. The composition is highly unusual in Veronese's work and the economical way in which it is painted is masterly. The absence of the sumptuous accessories usually favoured by Veronese and of any pattern or detail in Saint Helena's salmon pink and gold dress allows light to ripple over the softly blended colours like a dream flowing through the sleeping body. The effect has been likened to sunlight gleaming in damp sand on the seashore.

This picture's composition was derived from an anonymous print of Saint Helena (British Museum, London), which itself was based on a drawing by Raphael (Uffizi, Florence). The print probably represents Saint Helena, although Raphael's drawing may have been intended as someone else -- an early inscription identifies it as Danaë. Veronese's painting differs from the print in its dramatic cropping -- Saint Helena fills almost the entire canvas -- and the unusual, knotty grouping of angels and the Cross at the top. The cupid on the left and Saint Helena have lost their feet, which suggests that a little of the painted area has been cut off at the top and bottom of the picture, and the deterioration of the pigment smalt has caused the sky to turn from pale blue to yellow-grey.

The limited palette and relative roughness of the brushstrokes may reflect the painting's original purpose and location. It was probably not intended to be seen at close range, but was clearly designed to be displayed high above the viewer -- we can see the underside of Saint Helena's chin and only sky is visible through the window. It may have been made as one of the outside canvas shutters for a church organ, visible when the organ was not in use. The canvas is of a similar size to Veronese's shutters for the organ at S. Giacomo on the Venetian island of Murano. Organ shutters often showed pairs of saints, one on each shutter. The most likely companion saint for Helena would have been her son Constantine. Their images are commonly found in Franciscan churches dedicated to the True Cross (Santa Croce in Italian).

The National Gallery's painting may have been the Saint Helena that was listed in Rubens's collection in Antwerp after his death in 1640.

Style: High Renaissance
Jan van der Heyden was, and still is, particularly well known for his pictures of city streets and individual buildings. He was an expert at painting with meticulous attention to detail and seems to have relished depicting the surface texture of stone and brick at the smallest scale. Many of his buildings seem almost photographically real, an effect which was enhanced by his attention to the play of light and the angles of shadows. Often, as here, he would cast the foreground in shade and bathe the middle ground in sunlight, a technique which adds to the impression of depth and perspective in the painting.

Although he clearly liked to paint scenes that looked realistic, van der Heyden made adjustments to what he saw and often created entirely imaginary scenes. Sometimes he would compose fantasy buildings, combining elements from more than one structure. Here his approach is slightly different. He has taken two buildings which were in reality about seven miles apart and placed them much closer together. In the foreground is the sacristy of Utrecht Cathedral. Just across the cobbled street is Nijenrode Castle, which is located at Breukelen, well outside the city. 

Both buildings still exist but have been significantly altered since this painting was made. We can’t judge for sure whether the depiction of the castle is a faithful account of the building when van der Heyden saw it, but because he included it in several of his pictures we know that he often made changes to it. One of his paintings (now in a private collection) shows the castle from the same angle as here and, while both are similar in outline, there are numerous small differences between the two versions. We do know, from a late eighteenth-century drawing of the Cathedral, that the sacristy shown here is largely accurate. The key difference from reality is that van der Heyden has painted it as built of brick instead of stone, perhaps because he felt it would add detail and interest to the building.

The people and animals here add both interest and a sense of scale to the composition. Sometimes van der Heyden painted them himself, but these may have been added by Adriaen van der Velde, a specialist figure painter with whom he often collaborated.

Style: Baroque
This is the central panel of a triptych (a painting in three parts) that was made for the church of St Columba, Cologne. Its two side panels -- or shutters -- are in the collection of the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool.

A small group mourns the crucified Christ: the Virgin Mary, his mother, stands at the foot of the Cross with three distraught holy women, opposite a red-eyed Saint John the Evangelist.  Christ has been nailed to the Cross, while the two thieves crucified alongside him have been tied up with rope. The contorted poses of their bodies suggest the agony of the torture they are enduring, while Christ's body is serene in death.

The legs of the thieves have wounds above the knees, but Christ's do not. This is probably an allusion to the Gospel of John: 'But when [the Roman soldiers] came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs' (John 19: 33). Instead, the soldiers pierced his side with a spear. John makes it clear that Christ's bones were not broken so that he could be identified with the Jewish Passover lamb which, like Christ, was sacrificed to atone for sin. The Old Testament books of Exodus and Numbers instruct that the Passover lamb's legs should not be broken.

The background is filled with Roman soldiers on horseback. Among the crowd on the left Christ is shown before the Crucifixion, collapsing under the weight of his cross as he carries it to the site of his execution. The upper right of the panel shows his dead body being removed from the Cross.

Style: Gothic, Early Renaissance
This is one of several small and medium-sized Madonnas made by Raphael in the years immediately following his arrival in Rome, at the same time as he was painting his masterwork -- a suite of rooms in the Vatican palace for the pope, the so-called papal stanze. It was probably produced for a member of the papal court for private devotion, although we do not know who commissioned it. The painting is now known as the Garvagh Madonna or the Aldobrandini Madonna after two of its previous owners.

The Virgin Mary sits in a complex twisting pose -- sideways on a simple bench or plinth with one leg tucked under the other. She wears a blue, green and gold striped headdress bound up into a turban-like arrangement which was probably fashionable in Rome during Raphael's time. The infant Christ sits on his mother's lap, looking down towards the young John the Baptist, who passes him a red carnation -- symbolic of divine love and Christ's future Passion. Their gazes suggest the thoughts that pass between them. The space between the children's hands is the very centre of the careful geometry of the composition, emphasised by the lines of the architectural backdrop and the Virgin's features.

Christ's pose is very natural, although he seems to have an awareness greater than his years. The Virgin appears lost in melancholy thought as she draws John the Baptist's soft fur pelt closer to him and gathers her mantle to cover the naked Christ. Perhaps she is thinking of the children's destinies.

Two arched openings either side of the Virgin reveal views reminiscent of the countryside outside Rome. Through the left-hand arch is a church with a bell tower and hills shrouded in blue haze. A larger building, possibly also a church, is visible through the right-hand arch. In the underdrawing, the landscape continues beneath the central architecture, suggesting that Raphael first intended to set the figures before a simple stone parapet but then changed his mind. The vivid colours of the Virgin's clothes -- the bright pink of her dress and two subtly different blues of her shirt and mantle -- are echoed in the more soft and faded pastel hues of the misty landscape.

A study for the painting on pink paper in the Musée des Beaux Arts, Lille, shows that Raphael experimented with different positions for the children. There is no sign that the design for the final painting was transferred from a drawing, but there is a very precise geometrical plan in the underdrawing on the panel.

The dark backdrop and mouldings of the architecture very effectively frame the Virgin's oval face and the delicate bend of her neck. This approach of showing the Virgin in an interior between two arched windows occurs in early works by Leonardo, and it is possible that Raphael had these examples in mind. The complex psychological interaction between the figures also reflects earlier innovations by Leonardo. The figures are perfectly integrated into their setting, creating a sense of order and calm contemplation. Raphael makes divine harmony visible through geometry.

Style: High Renaissance
Sitting on a cloud, the Virgin Mary cradles the infant Christ to her cheek. Saints Hippolytus and Catherine stand in front of a grassy landscape. We see the figures from a low viewpoint, as would be expected when the painting was displayed above an altar.

Saint Hippolytus, a Roman knight, was miraculously converted to Christianity by Saint Lawrence whom he guarded in jail. He was martyred on 13 August 258 when he was torn apart by wild horses. Saint Catherine was condemned to be crushed on a wheel in the early fourth century. When the wheel miraculously broke, she was beheaded with a sword. She holds the sword in her left hand, and her left foot rests on a portion of the wheel. Saint Hippolytus gestures towards a distant group of buildings. He may be requesting special protection from the Virgin and Child for Flero or Onzato, where the painting was originally displayed. The palms that tell us the saints are martyrs and the papers that identify them may also be later additions, possibly by another artist. Their hands seem to have been planned without the palm fronds.

The two saints submitted to having their limbs broken rather than converting to paganism, which would have deprived them of salvation and confined them to a spiritual prison. The fractured slab of masonry with the inscription was an afterthought and hints of the landscape are now visible through it. It may have been added to emphasise the connection between the two martyrs. The inscription translates as: 'They chose to be dismembered rather than be sundered by chains everlasting.'

The painting came from the church of S. Eusebio in Onzato, a hamlet of Flero, 5 kilometres south of Brescia. The church, which was originally part of a small convent, was ceded to Conte Tomaso Caprioli, who may have commissioned this altarpiece shortly before his death in 1538.

The pose of the Virgin and Child -- cheek to cheek with the child held high across the Virgin's chest -- derives from a print by a local Brescian artist, Giovanni Maria da Brescia, a copy of which is now in the British Museum, London. The print copied and reversed the figures of the Virgin and Child from an engraving by Mantegna, possibly made 50 years before Moretto's painting. Moretto's Virgin and Child are also reversed, suggesting he followed Giovanni Maria da Brescia's print, and not Mantegna's original. Giovanni Maria's print is dated 1512 and dedicated to Achille Caprioli, who was a Carmelite friar and from the Caprioli family who commissioned Moretto's painting. It may be that the family had some special attachment to this image of the Virgin and Child.

The paint surface is severely damaged with the tops of the canvas threads exposed. The varnish has darkened and the painting is also disfigured by the darkened residue of older varnish, which creates a speckled effect in the clouds. The azurite blue of the sky may have darkened and the orange colour of the distant tree in front of the town was probably not intended.

Style: High Renaissance
A happy young couple make music in an elegant, panelled room with costly furniture. An open door, marble columns on either side, reveals a glimpse of a room beyond, where a fine gauze curtain hangs at a window. The young man sits at his ease, his long fingers plucking the strings of the theorbo -- an ancient instrument, now rarely played. The young woman plays the cittern, an instrument that's easier to master.

The book of music balanced precariously on the woman's knee reveals a pentimento, a visible trace of earlier painting beneath a layer of paint. The book may have been added almost as an afterthought; the folds in the woman's apron can now be seen through it. The cello in the background seems also to be an afterthought, almost hanging in midair, the hat perched on top cutting across the face of the servant in the shadows.

Molenaer displays his great skills in painting textures: the sleek coat of the dog, the gleam on the pewter jug and the intricate carving of the stool it stands on, and the fragile fretwork on the instruments. But most of all he enjoys the fabrics worn by the young couple: the man’s starched cuff, his richly decorated, ribboned sleeve and even the wrinkles of his stocking contrast with the delicate lace of the woman’s cap and collar, the soft lawn of her white cape and the green-pink sheen of her taffeta skirt. In her hair is a long, silver pin with a tiny jewel at the tip.

She places a foot on a foot warmer full of hot coals, a homely object that, in Dutch painting at this time, sometimes symbolised the passion with which a suitor pursues his intended bride. Molenaer, like many other genre painters, leaves his audience to draw their own conclusions -- or better still, to choose one of several meanings. The servant brings a plump chicken -- a bridal feast, an intimate supper or even symbolic of the young woman herself. The woman has discarded a shoe and wears a red stocking, and both were sometimes used as a sign of promiscuity. The footstool could be interpreted as fuelling the owner's desires since it heats not just the feet but under the skirts as well.

The sensitively painted faces of the three characters make the picture even more intriguing: the young man looks happy but the girl's expression is enigmatic, and the maid may or may not approve of events. But the little dog could stand for fidelity, and the closed lid of the jug for the unsullied virtue of the young woman, perhaps meaning that the music they play is a song of true love.

Style: Baroque
We see the skyline of Dordrecht, identifiable by the grey bulk of the Grote Kerk (Great Church) and the outlines of two of its watergates. The crenellations of the Vuilpoort (demolished in 1864) are in the centre, the tower of the Groothoofdspoort (which still survives) is on the right.

The emphasis is not on the city, but on the agricultural economy which supports it. Our eye is led into the picture by a milkmaid balancing two full pails as she walks back to her farm. Three windmills or pumps -- essential for grinding corn and preventing the meadows from flooding -- dominate the middle ground. Just over the bank is a small cargo barge.

While infused with a warm sense of rural tranquillity, the picture also subtly underlines the effort and organisation required to maintain prosperity. It once bore a false signature of Aelbert Cuyp but is now thought to be by Willem van Drielenburgh, who specialised in landscapes with towns in the background.

Style: Baroque
Piero de' Medici (1416--1469) was the son of Cosimo 'Pater Patriae' ('father of his country'), and father of Lorenzo the Magnificent (patron of Michelangelo). They were all members of the Medici, the leading family in Florence during the Italian Renaissance. Although Florence was a republic at the time, Piero was in effect ruler of the city from 1464 until 1469. He was known as Piero 'il Gottoso' ('the Gouty') because he suffered from the illness, which on occasions was so acute that the government of Florence took place from his bedside.

He commissioned the magnificent fresco of the Adoration of the Magi by Benozzo Gozzoli that decorates the Palazzo Medici Riccardi in Florence. His own portrait and those of several prominent members of the Medici family are included among the Magi’s attendants in Gozzoli’s fresco. He died at 53 of gout and lung disease and was buried in the Medici church of San Lorenzo in a tomb created by Andrea del Verocchio.

This posthumous portrait was based on a much earlier marble bust by Mino da Fiesole, which is now in the Bargello, Florence. It was painted during the rule of Cosimo I de’ Medici, Duke of Florence and later Grand Duke of Tuscany. As court artist Bronzino was required to supply many such images and this painting, lacking the clarity and finesse of rendering of Bronzino's autograph work, is likely largely to have been executed by his assistants. There is a copy of Bronzino’s Portrait of Cosimo I de’ Medici at the age of 40 in the National Gallery’s collection.

Cosimo commissioned works of art to establish images of rulership for the Medici family, who did not have royal or aristocratic origins and had previously been a leading family of Florentine bankers. He commissioned portraits of his ancestors, such as this one, to emulate the ancestral portrait collections of royal families as a way of reinforcing his own rule. This bust-length, three-quarter view pose was a standard format for ancestor portraits in such collections.

Bronzino was Cosimo’s favoured portraitist and Cosimo commissioned many works of art from him. He also commissioned Bronzino to paint frescoes in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, which had formerly been the seat of the republican government. The Palazzo Vecchio was Cosimo’s residence as Duke before he completed building works on a more spacious home at the Palazzo Pitti on the other side of the river Arno. Many of Bronzino’s portraits of Cosimo, his family and his ancestors are in the Uffizi's collection.

Style: High Renaissance, Mannerist
A lady dressed in colourful clothes and holding a fishing rod gazes merrily out of the picture. She is accompanied by a woman with a net and a man who picks up a basket of fish. Other men and women gather beside the meandering river, some casting and reeling in their fishing lines. In the distance, two shepherds and their sheep cross the shallow water and head towards a small group of people and animals in front of a small hamlet. A curved tree to the right and a steeply winding path on the left frame the scene.

Guiseppe Zais spent most of his career in Venice and is best known for his depictions of rural landscapes, the details of which are painted using thickly applied paint and bold colouring. Landscape with a Group of Figures, pendant to this picture, is also in the National Gallery's collection.

Style: Rococo, Neoclassical