wrmthorne/National_Gallery_style_classification huggingface dataset:
This portrait is one of Carel Fabritius's final works, made in the last year of his short life -- he died aged just 32. He was apprenticed to Rembrandt in Amsterdam between 1641 and 1643 and is generally considered one of his most talented pupils, but only about a dozen of his paintings survive.

Although it is impossible to be sure -- no documented likeness of Fabritius exists -- it is almost certainly a self portrait. The intensity of the gaze and the posture are reminiscent of a series of earlier self portraits made by Rembrandt and his other pupils. The costume he wears, including a soldier’s breastplate, also fits in with this tradition: Rembrandt, for example, painted himself as a soldier in the 1630s.

One intriguing aspect is the hat. The title, which would have been given to the painting long after it was made, describes it as fur, but the curls depicted in the rather obscure paintwork make it look more like wool. It’s possible that it had flaps which came down around the ears and neck -- a type of hat worn by sailors, and possibly soldiers -- but it is too ill-defined to be sure.

The fact that it was a self portrait probably wasn’t always considered important at the time. Self portraits of famous artists, such as Rembrandt, were collected by connoisseurs, but images of types or characters in different professions, known as tronies, were also popular and artists would use themselves as models. Fabritius may well have been painting for this market and would have also no doubt found the discipline of painting himself useful practice. It allowed him to develop his technique and experiment with different effects, materials and facial expressions.

Ten years after he had left Rembrandt’s studio, Fabritius was definitely developing his own style. This painting uses a brighter palette of colours and less dramatic lighting effects than those he had learned in Amsterdam. Instead of looming out of a deep, dark background -- like those we see in Rembrandt's work, including Self Portrait at the Age of 63 -- Fabritius has here set himself against a bright but cloudy sky. This is a very unusual backdrop and it creates its own sense of drama, especially because of our low viewpoint (we are slightly below the man, rather than on his level).

It may be that this use of lighter colours and a more airy atmosphere shows the influence of other artists in Delft where Fabritius had moved from Amsterdam in 1650. It was a move which had tragic consequences. On 12 October 1654, the same year that he made this painting, one of the gunpowder stores accidentally detonated and flattened a large part of the city, including the studio where he was working. Fabritius was pulled alive from the rubble but died of his injuries, and it is assumed that many of his pictures were destroyed. The scene of devastation was recorded in a painting by Egbert van der Poel, A View of Delft after the Explosion of 1654.

Style: Baroque
A small group of people meet to make music and enjoy each other’s company. We look over the back of a chair to see a young woman playing the violin in way unfamiliar to us, with the instrument resting on the table upright, similar to how a cello is played. We see the detail of her stiff, braided bodice, the gathers in her delicate apron and the glint of a pearl earring as she looks down at her instrument with great concentration.

A man smiles at the young woman sitting at her ease on the right. Pieter de Hooch has picked out her jewels, but without ostentation: a pearl necklace, long earrings and the ornament in her hair. The lace round the wide neck of her dress gleams a little and the red bows on her sleeve echo the red skirts swathed over her knees. The man, his broad brimmed hat jauntily tilted, toys with some food, while she holds a wineglass in her lap, stirring the wine with a slender metal stick.

The artist has given hardly any architectural detail to the courtyard in which they sit, which is unusual for him. We know by the dress of the occupants and the expensive Turkish carpet on the table that this is a sophisticated establishment, but we have little idea of their surroundings and they don't share the sunshine outside. Instead, de Hooch has given prominence to the houses seen across the canal, which are similar to those on the canals of Amsterdam. The left-hand one bears a tablet with the date 1620 and is in the style of Hendrick de Keyser, a prominent and innovatory Dutch architect of the time. Between us and these houses is a pavement, a balustrade and a canal.

After a move to Amsterdam, de Hooch began to paint sophisticated domestic settings and elegant figures in contrast to the tranquil middle-class interiors he had painted when he lived in Delft, like The Courtyard of a House in Delft. As in that picture, however, he has placed an enigmatic figure in the arch of an entrance. Here, it’s a man in silhouette; in The Courtyard of a House in Delft, it’s a woman, and she is a little more clearly defined. Although they are there to help us understand the depth of the view beyond, both are turned away from us. De Hooch gives them an air of mystery and leaves us wondering why they are there and where, if anywhere, they are going.

Style: Baroque
According to the Old Testament Book of Exodus, the Israelites and their flock were thirsty after failing to find water during their long journey through Egypt. They complained to Moses, blaming him for having taken them to the desert where they would die. Out of desperation, Moses asked God to intervene. God then instructed Moses to stand in front of the people with the elders of Israel and strike the rock of Horeb with his staff. A fresh stream of water gushed from the rock, and the Israelites and their animals quenched their thirst. This miracle was considered a prefiguration of the Christian Church's spiritual refreshment of man.

Giaquinto shows the elderly Moses brandishing the miraculous staff, while the Israelites drink eagerly from their cupped hands and vessels. The delicate hues of his draperies harmonise with those worn by the figures in the foreground and contrast with the dull colour of the brown rocky landscape setting. Pools of light at the front and in the middle distance create a sense of depth in the picture. The grey clouds in the distance may indicate an impending storm -- its rain and the miraculous stream would provide enough water for the Israelites to continue their journey.

This is a modello, or highly finished painted study, for a fresco in the apse of the basilica of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, Rome. As with the related Brazen Serpent, also in our collection, the dimensions are slightly larger than is usual for an oil sketch. This is probably so that the design could be approved by the Pope and the procurator of the Cistercian Order, Raimondo Besozzi, before its enlargement in fresco on the wall.

The National Gallery has other examples of painted sketches for frescoes in its collection. These include Luca Giordano's modelli for the Palazzo Medici Riccardi in Florence, and The Banquet of Cleopatra by Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, who, like Giaquinto, worked both in Italy and in Spain.

Style: Baroque, Rococo
A wicker basket tumbles on its side, pouring ripe fruit out into the light. At the foot of the luscious heap of melons, peaches and heavy bunches of grapes, two large tomatoes glisten. In the darkness above the fruit, large leaves seem to float in space, brittle and turning brown.

On the right, a black baluster-shaped vase holds a profusion of autumn flowers. They also seem to be falling towards the rough table top, and only the tall sheaf of stiff stalks disappearing upwards out of the picture seems to hold them back like a brake. The two elements of the painting are held together by an overblown pink rose leaning down to brush against a pale green melon in the heap of fruit.

For many years, the picture was considered to be the work of Eugène Delacroix. He made a few still-life paintings, mostly of flowers, but one or two of fruit. Although at first doubtful of the picture's authenticity, Edgar Degas, a great collector as well as an artist, was finally persuaded that it was by Delacroix and bought it, and it is thought that Auguste Renoir may have owned it after Degas’s death in 1917. Their faith in the picture wasn’t just based on style and technique -- it was backed up by the Delacroix studio stamp of authenticity on the back. But the painting has now been attributed to Pierre Andrieu, Delacroix's most trusted assistant. It does perhaps lack something of Delacroix’s energy and exuberance. The flowers are more carefully defined than his, and it’s unlikely that he would have left the large area of bare wall on the right of the picture, which makes the composition rather lopsided.

As Delacroix’s assistant, Andrieu would undoubtedly have seen his still-life paintings, and he had also been invaluable in restoring various of Delacroix’s major decorative works at the Paris City Hall and at the Luxembourg Palace when they became damaged. Andrieu was known to have sold copies of Delacroix’s pictures but also works of his own, mainly animal paintings. There were allegations that he passed off his own work as by Delacroix, but these were never substantiated. At the studio sale following Delacroix’s death, Andrieu was in possession of the wax seal that was fixed to the back of this picture -- perhaps accidentally, perhaps intentionally. But now it has been recognised as Andrieu’s work, the painting holds its own with a place in the National Gallery's collection.

Style: Realist
We look across the Grand Canal towards the facade of the domed church of San Simeone Piccolo, completed in 1738 -- it dwarves the surrounding houses and a small workmen’s hut to the left. People potter along the quayside and climb the church's steps to take a closer look. On the canal, several gondolas pass a fishing boat, their oars stirring the rippling water.

This small work lacks the refinement of Canaletto’s paintings; it is considered an imitation of his style. For a comparison, look at masterful and expansive view in Canaletto's Venice: The Grand Canal with San Simeone Piccolo, or the way he can evoke a face in just a few brushstrokes in Venice: The Doge's Palace and the Riva degli Schiavoni (versus the excessively simplified faces and figures here).

This composition may derive from an original painting by Canaletto, its location now unknown. Canaletto's detailed sketch in the Royal Collection at Windsor shows a similar view, but the steps leading to the entrance of the church are unfinished and surrounded by pieces of stone.

Style: Baroque, Rococo
We seem to have crept up on this small group of musicians. They turn towards us, apparently only just aware of our presence, though we're within touching distance. A highly focused light source creates sharp highlights, intense shadows and a sense both of drama and intimacy.

Dramatic lighting effects like this are now common in art, films and photography. But in the 1620s, when this painting was made, it was a revolutionary way for artists to depict the world. The man responsible for this revolution was Michelangelo Caravaggio. Between about 1597 and 1607 this radical young painter transformed the art scene in Rome, then the capital of the art world, and his influence quickly spread all over Europe.

Ter Brugghen was the first important Dutch painter to bring Caravaggio's ideas back to Holland. He had left Utrecht for Rome as a young trainee artist in 1604, aged about 16, when Caravaggio was at the height of his fame. We don’t know whether ter Brugghen met him but he certainly saw his paintings, and those of the many other artists in Rome who were copying and adapting his ideas.

This composition reveals Caravaggio’s influence in ways other than the dramatic lighting. The half-length figures crowded together within the composition and filling the pictorial space -- right up to the edges of the frame -- are typical of the Italian artist, as is the clarity and realism of the grapes in the foreground. The grapes not only give depth and perspective to the scene, but their sheen and transparency make them almost tangible. As well as these stylistic traits, ter Brugghen probably also borrowed the subject matter from Caravaggio: an early work of his shows a group of musicians preparing to play (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).

But while his artistic debts are clear, ter Brugghen has also developed his own style. Caravaggio usually used a light source from outside the picture; by contrast, here ter Bruggen uses two within the picture. The candle in the foreground provides the highlights while, right at the top, a smaller flame casts flickering shadows on the background walls. There is also a softness to the outlines and the features of the figures, and subtlety to the colour palette, which is characteristic of the Dutch artist and a contrast with the sharper delineation preferred by Caravaggio.

Meanwhile, the choice of instruments may be significant. Here we see the extremes of what was -- in the seventeenth century -- perceived of as a musical hierarchy. The voice of the singer ranked highest; strings were considered the most elevated of instruments while the flute had the lowest status. By combining them in one ensemble, perhaps ter Bruggen wanted to emphasise that this painting was as much about music itself as it was a portrait of a group of musicians.

We have another musical painting by ter Brugghen in the National Gallery, but his subject matter varied widely and included many biblical scenes, such as Jacob reproaching Laban for giving him Leah in place of Rachel.

Style: Caravaggist
This roundel (round panel) comes from the frame of the central panel of a multi-panelled altarpiece with an image of the baptism of Christ at the centre. It shows an angel, fingertips touched together gently in prayer.

The white strip decorated with crosses is a stole, usually worn by priests. The angel's feathered wings are blue and yellow, and the halo has been decorated with punch-marks -- indentations made with tools called punches. The background of the halo is indented with lots of tiny marks so that when the whole altarpiece was lit by candlelight it would have caught the light and glowed.

This is the only surviving frame decoration from the altarpiece, but there may have been other roundels showing angels dotted across the frame -- perhaps in homage to the name of the monastery, Santa Maria degli Angeli.

Style: Gothic, Early Renaissance
This large painting shows the three divine beings of the Trinity: God the Father, seated on an enormous white throne, supports his son, Christ, shown on the Crucifix on which he was killed; he seems minute by comparison. The Holy Ghost is represented by a dove that hovers between the two figures. On each side of the throne an angel kneels in adoration.

The simple colour scheme of green, red and white is striking against the gilded background. The design is symmetrical but the arrangement of the colours is asymmetrical: the angels have alternating red and green wings and robes. Their patterned robes emulate damask and contrast with the austere simplicity of the throne. Their decoration was created using imitation sgraffito, applying glazes of paint over areas of gilding, leaving some parts uncovered to create the patterns. This replicated the visual effects of the Italian sgraffito technique, where a layer of gold leaf was covered entirely by paint which was then scratched away in areas to reveal the metal beneath. The inscriptions on the scrolls crossed around the angels' necks were not intended to be legible. The reverse is painted with green tendrils of foliage against a white background.

The panel once formed the central part of an altarpiece with panels on either side – the hinge marks are still visible on either side of the frame, which is original to the picture. The side panels – or shutters – would protect and conceal the image when closed.  Four panels in Rastenberg Castle, Austria have been identified as the side panels originally connected to our panel. They show the Virgin, standing, holding the Christ Child; Saint Stephen holding a stone- a reminder that he was stoned to death; a nun-Saint, possibly Saint Clare, holding a skull and Saint Lawrence.

It has been suggested that the Virgin and Saint Stephen may have formed the inner side panels, closest to the central image, while Saint Lawrence and the female saint may have been the outer panels, as they are of a slightly lower quality. The identity of the artist has not yet been discovered but other works have been connected with this one, and the painter is sometimes known simply as the Master of the London Throne of Mercy.

Style: Gothic
Apollo in a red cloak shoots his arrows at two one-eyed men, one of whom lies prostrate on the ground as the other flees. These are the Cyclops, a mythical race of giants, each with a single eye in the middle of his forehead. This is one of ten frescoes by Domenichino and assistants which originally adorned the walls of a room known as the Stanza di Apollo in a garden pavilion in the grounds of the Villa Aldobrandini in Frascati, near Rome. All show stories of Apollo, and eight of them were transferred to canvas and are now in our collection.

Unlike the other stories in this cycle, this tale is not found in Ovid's Metamorphoses. According to Euripides' play Alcestis, Apollo killed the Cyclops in retaliation for the murder of his son, Asclepius, by Zeus: the Cyclops had made the thunderbolt which Zeus used to slay Asclepius.

The iconographical scheme of the frescoes was conceived by Domenichino's friend Giovanni Battista Agucchi,  both to glorify the Aldobrandini family and to express their philosophical and religious ideas. For them, Apollo was not just the god of the sun and the arts, but by extension the light of reason. Like Marsyas in another fresco in the cycle, The Flaying of Marsyas, the one-eyed Cyclops may represent the sensual and brutish aspects of human nature.

The picture is painted as a trompe l'oeil tapestry with an embroidered border. This is drawn up in the lower right corner to reveal a dwarf chained to a barred window, fruit and a plate with leftovers, some of which have been stolen by a cat. The dwarf was a real individual and a study for the figure, done from life, is in the Royal Collection at Windsor Castle. He was a retainer of Cardinal Pietro Aldobrandini and his inclusion in the painting is a kind of practical joke. The biographer Giovanni Battista Passeri recounted that Aldobrandini ordered the artist to paint the dwarf in this way as a punishment for impertinence.

This picture was originally on the left-hand wall of the Stanza di Apollo, next to Apollo slaying Python, which still remains in situ. The barred window mimicked a real window with bars on the opposite wall.

Style: Baroque, Academic
Christ gazes directly out at us from this small panel. Raising his right hand in blessing, he holds in his left hand a glass or crystal orb, decorated with gold bands set with pearls. On top of the orb is a jewelled gold cross and Christ wears a brooch set with precious stones.

This painting was the left-hand part of a diptych. Although this panel and another, The Virgin, are regarded as a diptych, they were adapted for this use and not originally made to go together. Small diptychs such as this may well have been used for private devotional meditation. Close observation reveals the fronts of three gabled houses reflected in the orb; the artist is cleverly suggesting the earthly realm of the Renaissance viewer.

This is not the suffering Christ of the Passion (as in Christ Crowned with Thorns by Dirk Bouts) but Christ as Salvator Mundi ('Saviour of the World'); the praying Virgin is interceding with him on behalf of sinful humanity. Massys must have been familiar with similar diptychs showing the suffering Christ as the 'Man of Sorrows' and the Virgin as the Mater Dolorosa, many of which were produced in the workshops of Dirk Bouts and Albrecht Bouts. This painting may rather be placed in the tradition of the Virgin and God the Father in the Ghent Altarpiece by Hubert and Jan van Eyck (St Bavo's Cathedral, Ghent), a tradition continued by Rogier van der Weyden in his Braque Triptych (Louvre, Paris) and in various paintings by Hans Memling and his followers.

Style: High Renaissance
In this slender painting, three musicians play their instruments -- a large triangle with rings, a recorder and a lyre. Two wear fur hats, perhaps identifying them as shepherds. None of them look out at the viewer, and two actually turn away, a pose for which Crespi was well known and which you can also see in Peasants with Donkeys, the companion piece to this work. The triangle player peers towards the left, as though looking at something outside the picture.

Behind the musicians, a turbaned man pulls his horse by the bridle. This detail is positioned in rather a strange way, probably because the top of the picture has been cut down: the animal seems to loom over the musicians and only its nose is visible. To the left, in almost complete darkness, are three soldiers deep in conversation. Several more on horseback enter the scene behind them.

Crespi was celebrated for his use of stark lighting, often set against a dark backdrop. Here, his nocturnal scene emphasises the triangular arrangement of the musicians and their movement, particularly the two nearest the foreground who play their instruments with enthusiasm. The contrast between dazzling light and deep shadow leads us through the composition, from the crossed legs of the lower musician to the face of the captivated child on the left, up to the back, torso, arms and moving fingers of the main figures, and then to the forearm of the man holding the bridle. To achieve these contrasts, Crespi built up the impasto in the lightest areas, creating luminous effects in the white sleeves and exposed skin of the musicians, but applied the paint thinly in shadowed areas, sometimes revealing the reddish ground. Many of his pictures have a monochrome palette of rich, earthy tones, predominantly warm reds and browns, with touches of off-white.

Although Crespi was trained with artists who worked in the academic tradition of painting, he chose to make himself the direct heir of the Carracci, a family of artists who had founded an Academy in Bologna, as a painter of everyday life. He was one of very few Italian artists of his day to paint kitchen scenes, domestic subjects and ordinary gatherings like the one depicted here.

Style: Baroque, Academic
An unidentified young man looks out at us with a direct gaze. Painted by an unknown artist, he is shown leaning against a stone archway that is partly covered with a swathe of white satin curtain. In the distance there is a tower and the suggestion of a hilly landscape.

The young man's youth is emphasised by his sparse moustache and wisp of a beard, yet his bearing is confident and he seems at his ease in his fine clothes. His cuffs and fashionable falling collar are made of expensive lace and the small tassels hanging at his neck are made of silver thread. The brim of an enormous hat encircles his long face. His mouth is full, his fair eyebrows arched. He holds a pair of leather gloves -- another expensive luxury -- in one hand; with the other, he gestures as if inviting us in towards him.

At this time in the Southern Netherlands, a wedding ring could be worn on your finger of choice, and the young man here has chosen to display his ring ostentatiously, as if for a purpose. Perhaps the gloves have a purpose too. A pair of them could also be a symbol of marriage, often as a gift to the bride from her husband. Beside the young man is a stone relief that shows one cupid, his arrow raised to strike a second, blindfolded cupid. The scene symbolises the triumph of 'Divine Love' over 'Earthly Love' and makes it likely, together with the ring and the gloves, that the portrait was painted to celebrate the sitter's betrothal or marriage.

Style: Baroque