wrmthorne/National_Gallery_style_classification huggingface dataset:
Ludolf Bakhuizen rarely made his seas calm or sunlit, unless he let a break in the clouds send a strand of pale light across the water. His is a northern sea with boats scudding before the wind, evoking the sound of straining timbers and slapping rigging.

In this painting, the waves in the darker area of the foreground have a rhythmic expression; Bakhuizen had trained as a calligrapher, when his pen would make sweeping curves and smaller, perhaps sharper, embellishments. But in his seas there is always a sense of depth, power and cold -- a sense of what it would feel like to fall from one of his fast-moving ships into the wild waters.

The vessel speeding towards the distant man-of-war (battleship) is a snaauwschip (known in England as a snow) -- a fast dispatch boat. It flies the blue flag of Leeuwarden, a port on the northern coast of the Netherlands, the coat of arms repeated on the stern. The man-of-war is at anchor, its sails furled, flying the Dutch colours. The snaauwschip tows a small vessel, perhaps to transfer a member of its crew with urgent orders for the man-of-war before it sets sail for one of the many wars fought by the Dutch in the seventeenth century.

The town on the horizon seems to be Dordrecht. The square tower and slender spire of the Grote Kerk (Great Church) stands on the left. Far off towards the right is the hexagonal tower of the Groothoofdspoort. This was the ancient gate through which travellers by water entered -- and can still enter -- the city that stands at the meeting of three rivers. The spiky sails of a windmill pierce the sky where it stands between the two great buildings.

On the left, in shadow, a wooden pier juts into the sea. Under the red tiles of a wooden shack a man and a woman are perhaps gutting fish ready for sale. Above them, a sail shivers in the wind as it's lowered by two men on board; another on shore coils a rope. They're watched by a stout man with his coat flying in the breeze and another squatting on a crate, their backs to us. With a flick of his brush, Bakhuizen shows us that the seated man's head is turned towards this homecoming vessel. A few sweeping strokes of paint turn the other's attention to the journey of the flying snaauwschip out on the river.

Closer to us the sea becomes more turbulent -- perhaps where the currents of two of the rivers meet. A small flat-bottomed boat lies low in the water, slapped and buffeted by the waves. The sail is lowered, not yet furled; something to be wrestled with in the wind. Overhead the weather-torn flag of Dordrecht flies on indomitably. Among all the expressive human backs that Bakhuizen shows us, just one human face looks out -- full of character, the owner's hand on the tiller -- unperturbed and calm in the face of nature's power.

Style: Baroque
Jan van der Heyden had an outstanding ability to make buildings seem almost photographically real (at least, that's how we might describe it today). He worked with extraordinary delicacy and precision, taking the trouble to delineate and shade the finest details of stone and brickwork and the play of light on every tile -- even in small paintings such as this. Look at the effects of weathering and the patched up repairs on the gable end of the building in the centre of the picture.

Despite it being painted in such a realistic way, this scene is almost certainly not a real one. As the title suggests, it's an architectural fantasy composed of elements of different buildings which the artist had probably visited and sketched in Germany and Holland. Van der Heyden painted several such scenes; they were probably appreciated for their exoticism and the way they evoked a sense of an ideal city once great, now ruined.

We seem to be looking at the entrance to that city. The brickwork of the defensive walls is largely intact, but the fortified tower to the right has been overgrown by trees and shrubs and the stone pavements have been partly ripped up. There is a mix of architectural styles among the surviving buildings. The one in the centre is typical of the mid-sixteenth-century flamboyant Gothic style of Franconia, Braunschweig and the area surrounding Cologne. The building on the far left is much more Dutch in character and the ruined tower beyond is reminiscent of a windmill. The grand stone gateway has classical pilasters and Corinthian capitals (the distinct, typically broader section at the head of a pillar or column). It may have been inspired by one of the seventeenth-century gates of Amsterdam, although it does not resemble any of them closely.

Sometimes van der Heyden would use another, specialist, artist to add figures to his cityscapes. They help to create a sense of scale, lead the eye through the painting and bring the scene to life. In this case they were painted by his frequent collaborator Adriaen van de Velde, and they seem to have an added dimension -- one which reflects the architectural theme of grandeur and ruin with its social equivalent. In the central scene a one-legged beggar holds out his cap to a pair of fancily dressed sightseers. Their interest in the buildings around them is obvious, but they seem oblivious to his plight.

Style: Baroque
The Archangel Michael led an army of angels to battle against the devil and cast him down from heaven (Revelation 12: 9). Piero shows him as a beautiful, youthful soldier, dressed in Roman armour, embellished with gemstones. Golden curls frame his smooth pale skin and full lips. His strength and courage are proved by his grim accessory -- the severed head of the devil, represented as a snake with pointy ears and a full set of fangs. The kill is fresh: the reptilian head seems to still be screaming in anguish, blood dripping from its mouth; Michael pins the body down with his foot as its tail continues to rattle.

Michael's pale wings match his skin. A cool light washes over him, casting the left side of his legs and face in shadow. His pose, where most of his weight is on his left foot and his body sways gently in the opposite direction, is called contrapposto; it was adopted by Renaissance artists who were copying the graceful style of Classical sculptures. The definition of the muscles of his chest and abdomen beneath his breastplate also recalls the idealised bodies of ancient nude male sculpture. His skin is notably pale and -- perhaps to stress this visual connection with sculpture -- Piero has made no attempt to differentiate the archangel's skin from that of the marble decorating the low wall behind him.

The panel was part of a polyptych made for the church of Sant' Agostino in Piero's hometown of Borgo Sansepolcro. It was placed to the immediate left of the central panel, now lost, which depicted the Virgin and Child according to both sixteenth- and nineteenth-century descriptions.  The lower right corner of the panel includes part of the step of the Virgin's throne and part of her cloth of gold cloak. Michael was paired with Saint Augustine, who stood to his left (now in the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon); to the right of the Virgin were Saint John the Evangelist (The Frick Collection, New York) and Saint Nicholas of Tolentino (Museo Poldi Pezzoli, Milan).

The archangel's inclusion may be related to the name of the patron of the altarpiece, Angelo di Giovanni. Michael was very popular in Sansepolcro: the pilgrimage to Monte Sant' Angelo in southern Italy, 325 miles from Sansepolcro -- where Michael was thought to have appeared miraculously -- was the most popular pilgrimage among the citizens of the town.

Piero was in great demand when he was commissioned to make this picture which may explain why, even though he signed the contract to make it in 1454, it was not completed until 1469.

Style: Early Renaissance
The infant Christ is seated on the Virgin Mary's lap, accompanied by saints in the meadows of a mountainous landscape. The large semi-ruined classical building behind them divides the composition into three parts and makes the Virgin and Child appear enthroned in the centre. A youth scales the wall of the building, which is marked with an indecipherable coat of arms and kabbalistic characters. The Kabbalah was a mystical method of interpreting scripture developed by rabbis. In images of the Nativity, a ruined classical building is usually a symbol of the ancient pagan world being superseded by the new Christian era.

The Virgin and Child are flanked on either side by two saints, each with objects (known as attributes) that allow us to identify them. Saint James sits reading on the left. His pilgrim’s hat, decorated with the scallop shell worn by those who have made the pilgrimage to Santiago da Compostella, hangs on his back with a cross and Saint Veronica’s veil. Saint Jerome is identifiable by his scarlet robes but he is without the lion that usually accompanies him. He looks up from his Bible to gaze at the infant Christ. Behind him a group of soldiers in armour ride across the landscape. On the right of the landscape, a lion -- perhaps Saint Jerome's -- is attacking one of the herd of cows grazing nearby. The herdsman is sleeping at the far right. This scene perhaps symbolises the need for watchfulness against the devil.

Saint Catherine of Alexandria holds a fragment of the spiked wheel on which she was tortured for her Christian faith and looks at us. She points at the infant John the Baptist, who kisses his cousin Christ’s foot in reverence. In one hand he holds a reed cross and in the other a scroll marked with letters from the phrase Ecce Agnus Dei ('Behold the Lamb of God'). The scroll and reed cross refer to Christ’s sacrifice for the salvation of mankind. The Virgin turns to us as though unable to watch as her baby son reaches for the cross, about to grasp the destiny that awaits him. The hands and limbs of this group have been carefully positioned to lead our eyes towards the message contained in this image.

This type of composition in which the Virgin and child are accompanied by saints is known as a sacra conversazione (‘holy conversation’). Although the holy figures are not usually shown speaking, the term implies a psychological connection between them. The horizontal format sacra conversazione set in a landscape was established by Giovanni Bellini and Cima and made popular in early sixteenth-century Venice by artists in the circle of Titian, particularly Palma Vecchio, to whom this picture was once attributed. But it is looser and coarser in handling than paintings by him and is now generally dated to a relatively early phase of Bonifazio's career.

Style: High Renaissance
Ary Scheffer, born in Holland but trained and living in France, had a particular appeal to English visitors to the French capital. They were attracted to his lively studio, which was known for its gossip and music as well as his paintings, and they admired both his support of liberal, constitutional monarchy and his high moral tone. Lady Eastlake, wife of the Director of the National Gallery Sir Charles Lock Eastlake, described Scheffer as a man 'with whom no lady, however high in rank, could take a liberty, and in whose studio no man ventured to smoke'.

Scheffer’s list of English acquaintances, most of whom were progressive in their opinions, was impressive. Among those who called on him or sat for their portraits were the poets Robert and Elizabeth Browning, the novelists Charles Dickens, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Elizabeth Gaskell, the political philosopher John Stuart Mill and the sociologist Harriet Martineau. Mrs Robert Hollond was part of this circle.

She was born Ellen Julia Teed in India in 1822, and in 1840 married Robert Hollond, a pioneering balloonist and MP for Hastings. After the marriage she spent part of each year in Paris where she established a regular salon; she was also a well-known traveller and philanthropist who founded the first crèche in London and English nurses’ homes in Paris and Nice. She died in 1884.

In 1851, when Scheffer painted this formidable woman’s portrait, he did not emphasise her status as a society figure -- she could equally well be a Roman matron or a figure from the Bible. She is posed outdoors under a clear blue sky, wearing a classicising gown and robe, with no jewellery other than a gold-coin bracelet.  She looks sideways out of the picture with a soulful and poetic expression.  The colour scheme is restrained, dominated by blue, pink and white. Scheffer aimed for and achieved a composition of eloquent simplicity in which Mrs Holland is depicted as a woman of feeling. The intimacy of the portrait suggests that this was a private commission.

Three years later, Scheffer is said to have used Mrs Hollond as the model for Saint Monica in his painting of Saints Augustine and Monica. Perhaps, when he turned to this Biblical work, he remembered the spiritual expression of the woman he had painted earlier.

Mrs Hollond gave Boucher's Pan and Syrinx to the National Gallery in 1880.

Ary Scheffer's Paris studio is now the Musée de la Vie romantique

Style: Neoclassical, Romantic
In late fifteenth-century Venice, a striking style of portraiture derived from Netherlandish examples was being popularised in the city by the Sicilian artist Antonello da Messina; this is a typical example of it. Its key elements -- the dark background, the three-quarter pose and the sharp lighting -- are found here.

The cartellino (the painted scrap of paper attached to the green stone ledge) has been signed and dated by Francesco Bonsignori. We can't be sure who this old man is, but the portrait of him is distinctive, both for the observation of his features and for the way that his distant gaze encourages us to imagine what he might be thinking. Bonsignori has, unusually, included a detailed study of the man's ear. In most portraits like this the ear was covered by a hat or hair, but he seems to enjoy its shell-like curves and fleshy, round lobe. The three-quarter view of the man's head makes his unusually shaped nose an equally distinctive feature of the picture. His jaw muscles have loosened with age, creating wobbly jowls; his pale blue-grey eyes and strong, almost pointed, features give a sense of his intellect and character.

Technical examination has shown underdrawing beneath the paint surface, which acted as a guide for the outlines of the man's features and also for details such as the wrinkles around his eyes. The precision of the drawing suggests that it is based on a cartoon, a design that was manually transferred onto the panel.

A drawing that matches this portrait of the old man almost exactly is now in the Albertina Museum, Vienna. The Vienna drawing is sometimes thought to be by Mantegna, Bonsignori's contemporary; they met in the city of Mantua. It has even been suggested that Mantegna supplied Bonsignori with the drawing but there's not enough evidence to be sure. It seems more likely that Bonsignori made the drawing as a preparatory study before the painting. This is the only close-up portrait drawing by the artist to survive, but drawing was a very important part of his artistic process. Isabella d'Este, Marchioness of Mantua, admired his drawings, praising the one he made when painting her young son Federigo.

The sharp intellect that shines through the man's face seems to have been put to use in a senior position in the administration of Venice: he wears the black stole and cap that were the uniform of the Venetian citizen and patrician classes, but the red tunic (fur-lined here) indicates that he was either a magistrate or a member of one of the city's councils. Documentary evidence suggests that he might be Giovanni Cappello, a senator and procurator from the San Marco area of the city from about 1466. We can't be sure, but the costume and date do make this possible, especially as Giovanni Cappello would have been around 60 at the time this portrait was made.

Style: Early Renaissance
This fragment comes from a large painting in fresco -- a technique that involved painting directly onto wet plaster -- that showed the fall of Lucifer, the rebel angel who was cast out of heaven. It once decorated a wall of the church of the confraternity of Sant' Angelo in Arezzo. There are two other fragments in our collection: Decorative Border with a Kneeling Flagellant and Saints Michael and Stephen and Decorative Border with a Seraph and Saint Catherine.

Here we see Saint Michael the archangel, who was the central figure in the fresco. His large wings, halo and armour identify him: he was one of the warrior angels. He raises his arm, ready to strike with his sword; we can see its hilt in his hand. He is supported by several other angels, also dressed in elaborate armour and bearing shields and spears.

We know from a nineteenth-century engraving of the fresco that Saint Michael is battling a seven-headed dragon, which is how Lucifer is described in the New Testament (Revelation 12:3).

Style: Gothic, Early Renaissance
In his right hand, this gentleman holds a letter addressed to him: Nobili Joanni Christophoro Longono amigo ('Noble Giovanni Cristoforo Longoni, friend').  We can assume this is his own name and that the letter was included as a subtle way of identifying him. His black mantle and cap are a sign of his social status: these were worn by men of the middle and upper classes in many Italian cities in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. The position of his left hand on the marble parapet in front of him draws attention to his rings, which may indicate his wealth or official status. He is shown something between a frontal and a three-quarter pose, which emphasises the breadth of his torso; his gaze is confident, perhaps leaning towards arrogant.

The format of the portrait, with its landscape background with a river running through it was known as 'alla fiammingha', that is, 'Flemish style'. It was popularised in Italy by the works of southern Netherlandish painter, Hans Memling. The inclusion of the sitter's hands -- which allowed the inclusion of personal, identifying objects like the letter -- was also an innovation that came from northern Europe. Both elements are found in A Man with a Pink.

We know little of Longoni apart from that he was living in Milan in the late 1490s. Solario was from Milan but he spent time working in Venice, where he painted A Man with a Pink. On his return to Milan after 1495 his work began to more closely reflect the innovations of Leonardo da Vinci, who had spent several years working in the city. The sombre and somewhat gloomy landscape background with its blue-grey tones reflects the mysterious landscapes that Leonardo painted in the background of his portraits and religious images, such as Virgin of the Rocks. The way in which Solario has painted the sitter's face also shows that he has studied Leonardo's technique. The transitions between light and shade are very subtle, creating a slightly blurred or smoky effect called sfumato, which was one of Leonardo's innovations.

Renaissance portraiture had a profound purpose: to commemorate an individual's appearance as well as their character. They were thought to stand in for a sitter's presence and, after death, their soul.  The inscription in Latin on the parapet translates as 'You know not what sort of person you were or will be; devote much time to an earnest effort to see what sort of person you are', suggesting the portrait itself captures Longoni's image at this moment as well endeavouring to examine his mind and personality.

Style: High Renaissance
This striking half-naked figure is Saint John the Baptist. He comes from the polyptych which Crivelli painted in 1476 for the high altar of the church of San Domenico, in Ascoli Piceno in the Italian Marche. The saint's stance, one leg bent and hip curved out to the side, gives him a sense of solidity. We can see the sinews and veins of John's hands and feet, his long bony toes and ankles, and the individual hairs of his hair and on the inside of the skin laced around him; this level of naturalistic detail is more characteristic of Netherlandish painters, like Rogier van der Weyden, than of Crivelli's fellow Italian artists. The smooth gold of his body and the roughness of the animal skin he wears contrast with the deep, crisp folds of the lavish pink and green fabric wrapped around him.

Unlike the other saints made for the main section of this altarpiece, John stands not on a marble parapet but in a wilderness of pink rocks scattered with bare trees. A clear stream flows along the front of the painting, and reeds sprout up along the water's edge. Through the translucent water we can see pebbles scattered on the river bed. The barren landscape and the saint's apron allude to the years John spent as a hermit in the desert, punishing his body with uncomfortable clothes and poor food to bring him closer to God. John is said to have worn a camel skin -- hair side towards  his flesh so that it  was scratchy and uncomfortable -- and to have foraged for food, eating wild honey and locusts.

The stream is the River Jordan where John baptised the people of Judea and Jerusalem, Jesus among them. Parts of the near bank are visible at the bottom of the painting, making us feel that we are only separated from John by the river. A small bird, its back turned to us, perches on a branch to John's right. It is perhaps a goldfinch, a symbol of Christ's passion. An almost identical bird appears in another painting by Crivelli,  The Vision of the Blessed Gabriele Ferretti. Perhaps Crivelli kept a model book with drawings of birds and animals, such as we know other fifteenth-century artists used.

In a detail typical of Crivelli, the saint gazes downwards, so that we see only the top of his head and his foreshortened features. He points at the scroll which curls from his right hand, on which is written: Ecce Agnus Dei, Ecce Qui. Theses are the first words of the phrase with which John recognised Christ as the Messiah when he baptised him: 'Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.'

Style: Early Renaissance
This panel was once framed together with a scene showing the three Marys at Christ's tomb. Both belong to a series showing events from the life of Christ, from his death to his Resurrection, which formed the middle tier of a large multi-panelled altarpiece made for the Florentine convent church of San Pier Maggiore. The central scene showed the coronation of the Virgin Mary.

Christ, dressed in white and gold flowing robes lined with red, is the focus of the scene. He rises from his tomb and ascends majestically to heaven, carrying a flag that symbolises the Resurrection. The artist has incised the gold leaf of the sky with multiple fine lines that would have reflected the candlelight of the altar below and made Christ appear as though he was glowing. The surrounding trees reflect this golden light.

Below him, surrounding his tomb, seven Roman soldiers have fallen asleep: they do not notice the miraculous heavenly event taking place. Their helmets and shields are inscribed with the letters SPQR, the abbreviation of the title for the Roman state: Senatus Populusque Romanus ('the Senate and people of Rome'). They were posted by the tomb to ensure that Christ's body was not stolen and no claims of a false resurrection were made by Jesus's followers. Christ's resurrection, however, was real and, as this scene shows, occurred without the tomb even being opened -- stressing how mistaken the Roman authorities were to send guards.

The artist may have drawn inspiration for the composition from frescoes in the so-called Spanish chapel of the Florentine church of Santa Maria Novella painted only a decade earlier by Andrea da Firenze.

Style: Gothic, Early Renaissance