Gustave Dore

The sight of Antioch, so celebrated in the annals of Christianity,

revives the enthusiasm of the Crusaders.

French printmaker, one of the most prolific and successful book illustrators of the late 19th century, whose exuberant and bizarre fantasy created vast dreamlike scenes widely emulated by Romantic academicians.

A luminous angel guides the Crusaders marching at night.

In 1847 he went to Paris and from 1848 to 1851 produced weekly lithographic caricatures for the Journal pour Rire and several albums of lithographs (1847–54). His later fame rested on his wood-engraved book illustrations. Employing more than 40 woodcutters, he produced over 90 illustrated books. Among his finest were an edition of the Oeuvres de Rabelais (1854), Les Contes drolatiques of Balzac (1855), thelarge folio Bible (1866), and the Inferno of Dante (1861). He also painted many large compositions of a religious or historical character and had some success as a sculptor; his work in those media, however, lacks the spontaneous vivacity of his illustrations.

Niko Pirosmanashvili ( Pirosmani )

Carousal

1905-1907

Oil on Canvas

177x113 cm

Georgian painter. He was orphaned at an early age and brought up by his father’s employer in Tbilisi. He worked first as a brakesman on the Transcaucasian Railway, then, following a brief and financially unsuccessful foray into business, he became an itinerant painter of signboards, windows and murals, working mainly for the shopkeepers in and around Tbilisi. He had no special schooling and evolved his own naive style based upon the colours, rhythms and spatial concepts of Georgian folk art. His animal paintings and portraits are particularly impressive. His Carousal series (c. 1906; Tbilisi, Mus. A. Georg.) depicts traditional aspects of Georgian life.

Josip Generalic

The Hlebine Jadwiga

Born in village of Hlebine, Republic of Croatia, on February 19, 1936.First oil paintings on canvas date from 1950. His first public appearance took place in 1954 in the town of Krizevci near Koprivnica, where he graduated at the Teachers’ Training College.In 1959 he displayed his artworks for the first time on a one-man exhibition in City’s museum in Koprivnica.

During his life, Josip Generalic has displayed his artworks on more than 1.000 collective exhibitions and 200 one-man exhibitions around the world. He was regularly present in all representative exhibitions of the Croatian and world’s naive art. The famous artist has been awarded by many international juries.

Generalic did a few scene paintings for Zagreb theatres; he ilustrated childrens’ books and made about thirty tapestries; one of them entitled the “Big Grape Harvest” is permanently displayed in the Museum of Modern Art in Soitama, Japan. Josip’s oil on glass and canvas paintings, his serigraphies and copper-plate etchings can be found in many galeries and museums. For 15 years, he’s been working intensively on copper etchings, using his own press. Generalic has been acclaimed by the critics as the top artist in the field of paintings and graphics and one of the gratest representatives of the world famous “Hlebine school”. Josip Generalic’s works of art are classified into four phases: the Hlebine verism, flower phase, portraits of distinguished persons and black phase.Josip Generalic died in Koprivnica on 22nd Dec 2004 and has been buried in Hlebine.