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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/22/24) Albrecht Dürer (German, 1471-1528) The Life of the Virgin: The Annunciation (c. 1503-05) Woodcut, 41.9 x 29.8 cm. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (George Khuner Collection)

Around 1503–1505 Dürer produced the first seventeen of a set illustrating the Life of the Virgin, which he did not finish for some years. The Life of the Virgin, showing narrative scenes from the life of Mary, the mother of Jesus, is a common subject for pictorial cycles in Christian art, often complementing, or forming part of, a cycle on the Life of Christ. In both cases the number of scenes shown varies greatly with the space available. Works may be in any medium: frescoed church walls and series of old master prints have many of the fullest cycles, but panel painting, stained glass, illuminated manuscripts, tapestries, stone sculptures and ivory carvings have many examples.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/21/24) Remedios Varo (Catalan/Mexican, 1908–1963) Papilla Estelar (1958) Oil on canvas, 50 x 70 cm. Gallery Wendi Norris, San Francisco

Highly influenced by literature, nature, religion, and her friendships with fellow Surrealist painter Leonora Carrington and the photographer Kati Horna, Varo translated her intellectual and spiritual curiosities into fantastical images. From the cloaked woman with almond-shaped eyes and wild silver hair, preparing to free herself from a male spirit in "Woman Leaving the Psychoanalyst" (1960), to a slender female figure who is seen perched in space, grinding the stars, and feeding a caged crescent moon in "Celestial Pablum" (1958), Varo’s paintings are the wildest of dreams.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/20/24) Edmund Blair-Leighton (British, 1853–1922) In Time of Peril (1897) Oil on canvas, 124.5 x 168.9 cm. Auckland (NZ) Art Gallery (Mackelvie Trust Collection)

Edmund Blair Leighton specialised in the historical genre that stood at the apex of the academic system. "In Time of Peril" appeared at the Royal Academy exhibition of 1897, the year that marked the triumphant sixtieth anniversary of Queen Victoria's reign. It depicts two young princes spirited away from danger and being comforted by their glamorous mother. The royal refugees and their precious cargo arrive at a protective monastery -- safe from harm, if not from public scrutiny. It was a canny choice of subject, for dynastic anxieties inevitably lurk in the wake of aging monarchs.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/19/24) Domenico Ghirlandaio (Florentine, 1449-1494) Announcement of Death to St. Fina (c. 1473-75) Fresco Collegiata, San Gimignano

Fina, the pious daughter of poor parents, died on the feast day of Saint Gregory in 1253 after a long and painful illness. Pope Gregory the Great, in full regalia, appears floating in a glory of red winged angels to bless the young woman and announces her imminent death. At the instant she died, white, beautifully scented flowers blossomed forth from her bed of pain. The witnesses to this miracle are her old nurse and another woman, possibly a helpful neighbor. The neighbor greets the great Church Doctor hesitantly with a gesture of restrained fright.

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MWW Artwork of tthe Day (12/18/24) Gianlorenzo Bernini (Italian, 1598-1680) David (c. 1623-24) Carrara marble statue, 170 cm. high Galleria Borghese, Rome

In comparison to the earlier celebrated David sculptures, Bernini paid particular attention to the biblical text and sought to follow it as closely as possible. Unlike the earlier sculptures, Bernini's hero has a shepherd's pouch around his neck which already contains pebbles ready to use in the deadly sling which he will use against Goliath. The upper part of David's body is represented immediately after has taken a stone from his pouch. This means that the torso twists and strains not just physically but psychologically. The hero is depicted when, having taken the stone from his pouch, he twists his body in the opposite direction, tensioning it spring-like, then stops to think for a spilt second before releasing the stone that will slay Goliath.

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MWW Artist of the Day (5/11/20) James Kay (Scottish, 1858-1942) Greenock (c. 1890) Oil on canvas, 30 x 46 cm. Private Collection

James Kay was a Scottish painter best known for his depictions of landscapes and shipping docks on the River Clyde near Glasgow. His works were strongly influenced by Impressionism, but he maintained a distinctive thick application of paint and an idiosyncratic use of color. Born on October 22, 1858 on the Isle on Arran, Scotland, UK, he went on to study at the Glasgow School of Art. Kay began exhibiting at the Paris Salon in 1894 and won the gold medal at the Salon in 1903 for his painting "River of the North." Kay was an elected member of both the Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolor.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/16/24) Vincenzo Carducci (Italian, 1576-1638) Miraculous Return from San Juan de Mata (c. 1634-35) Oil on canvas, 237 x 236 cm. Museo del Prado, Madrid

Carducci primarily painted religious subjects. In 1632 he completed Europe's most extended cycle of monastic paintings: fifty-six influential canvases illustrating the lives of Saint Bruno and other Carthusians for a Carthusian monastery near Segovia. Carducci may be most recognized for his contributions to Spanish art theory. This work was part of the series of twelve canvases on the lives of San Félix de Valois and San Juan de Mata, founders of the Order of the Holy Trinity of Redemption of Captives, painted by Carducci for the church of the convent of the Barefoot Trinity in Madrid.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/15/24) Carl Larsson (Swedish, 1853–1919) A Home: In the Corner (c. 1898) Watercolor on paper, 32 x 43 cm. Nationalmuseum, Stockholm

Carl and Karin Larsson combined new design with old traditions. Practicality dictated their interior design, but it was equally important that furniture and objects form an attractive harmony. Karin designed the furniture and textiles, which she embroidered and wove. A studio was fitted up in one of the hallways. It features many eye-catching details, including the funny man crowning a column. When a larger studio extension was added, this room became a workshop for the whole family. The interiors of the Larsson home were characterised by rural simplicity. Nevertheless, every detail was carefully designed, with influences from England, Scotland and Japan.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/14/24) Amrita Sher-Gil (Indian, 1913-1941) Three Girls (1935) Oil on canvas, 92.8 x 66.5 cm. National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi

"Three Girls" was Sher-Gil's first painting after her return to India from Europe in 1934. The painting reflects the influence of the works of French painter Paul Gauguin on Sher-Gil's work. It also marks her move from an earlier academic and realist style of painting that she had learned in Paris towards a flatter style with modern compositions, where line and color are prominently used. In "Three Girls," the girls' surrounding is not shown. Their situation is made evident through their facial expressions, their body language, and the skillful use of tones.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/13/24) Pablo Picasso (Spanish, 1881-1973) Self-portrait with Palette (1906) Oil on canvas, 92 x 73 cm. The Philadelphia Museum of Art (A.E. Gallatin Collection)

Picasso settled in Paris in April 1904, and his circle of friends soon included Guillaume Apollinaire, Max Jacob, Gertrude and Leo Stein, as well as two dealers, Ambroise Vollard and Berthe Weill. His style developed from the Blue Period (1901–04) to the Rose Period (1905) to the pivotal work Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907), and the subsequent evolution of Cubism from an Analytic phase (ca. 1908–11) to its Synthetic phase (beginning in 1912–13). Picasso’s collaboration on ballet and theatrical productions began in 1916. Soon thereafter, his work was characterized by neoclassicism and a renewed interest in drawing and figural representation.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/12/24) Francisco Goya (Spanish, 1746-1828) Self-Portrait in the Workshop (c. 1790-95) Oil on canvas, 42 x 28 cm. Museo de la Real Academia de San Fernando, Madrid

Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes welcomed and received official honors and worldly success with enthusiasm. At the same time he left a ruthlessly penetrating record of his patrons and private expressions of introspection, moral objectivity, and caustic commentary on his times. In this remarkable self-portrait that he painted in the early 1790s, Goya is at work on a large upright canvas, presumably a portrait, his eyes turned away from it towards his subject, which contemporary viewers might well have recognized as themselves. Bright sunshine floods from a large window behind the painter, and he wears a curious hat with candle holders on the brim.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/11/24) Byzantium (c. 350-1453 CE) Saint John the Evangelist (c. 1120-40) Tempera colors, gold, and silver on parchment, 22.9 x 16.5 cm. The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

John sits on a fancy bench next to a lectern that holds his writing utensils. On his lap he holds a scroll with the words In principio erat verbu[m] et verbum erat apud d[eu]m (In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God). The anonymous artist of this manuscript, like most German Romanesque illuminators, took delight in patterned ornament. He used multicolored fretwork and gold and silver interlace on the frame and variously patterned the marble of the lectern. He defined the folds of the saint's garments with simple geometric forms.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/10/24) Jean-Léon Gérôme (French, 1824-1904) The Marabou (1888) Oil on canvas, 39 x 30.5 cm. Arnot Art Museum, Elmira, New York

In this work, an Arabian man leans against a door jamb while a marabou walks in the street. Some scholars suggest the whip the man holds indicates that the marabou is his pet. The precise detail of the textures -– the roughly hewn masonry, finely carved decoration, the door’s wood grain, the richness of the man’s satin robe, and the bird’s soft plumage -– is characteristic of Gérôme’s style and a testament to his technical skills. Battling roosters, placid marabou storks, and regal cranes populate these compositions, establishing the artist as one of the nineteenth century’s most astute natural history painters and animaliers.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/9/24) Rembrandt van Rijn (Dutch, 1606-1669) & Workshop Joseph Accused by Potiphar's Wife (1655} Oil on canvas, 106 x 98 cm. National Gallery, Washington DC (Andrew W. Mellon Collection)

The story of Joseph fascinated Rembrandt, who made numerous drawings, prints, and paintings of this Old Testament figure. In this scene from the book of Genesis, chapter 39, Potiphar's wife, having failed to seduce Joseph, falsely accuses him of trying to violate her. Speaking to Potiphar, the wife points to the red robe Joseph left behind when he ran from her clutches, wickedly using the presence of the garment as evidence to support her accusation. In the biblical account, Joseph was not present, but the artist added poignancy to his visualization of the story by inserting Joseph on the far side of the bed.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/8/24) William Blake (British, 1757–1827) Elohim Creating Adam (c. 1795-1805) Color print finished in ink & watercolor on paper, 43.1 x 53.6 cm. The Tate Gallery, London

Elohim (the Hebrew name for God as Justice) is seen here bringing man (symbolized by Adam) from the world of immortal spirit into the world of mortal humanity. Adam doesn't seem to enjoying the trip. For Blake the God of the Old Testament was a false god. He believed the Fall of Man took place not in the Garden of Eden, but at the time of creation shown here, when man was dragged from the spiritual realm and made material. In the mid-1790s Blake experimented with a technique he had invented for color printing. One to three impressions were taken directly from a tempera painting on millboard, and then touched up with watercolor and pen.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/7/24) Osman Hamdi (Turkish, 1842-1910) The Tortoise Trainer (Kaplumbaga Terbiyecisi)(1906) Oil on canvas, 221.5 x 120 cm. Pera Museum, Istanbul

Osman Hamdi Bey was an Ottoman statesman, intellectual, art expert, as well as a prominent and pioneering Turkish painter, an accomplished archaeologist, and the pioneer of the museum curator's profession in Turkey. His 1906 painting, "The Tortoise Trainer", expresses a sarcastic innuendo on the painter's own view of his style of work compared to those of his collaborators and apprentices, and is also a reference to the historical fact of tortoises having been employed for illuminative and decorative purposes, by placing candles on the shell, in evening outings during the Tulip Era in the early 18th century.

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MWW Artwork of the Day (12/6/24) John Piper (British, 1903-1992) Skelton Church, Yorkshire (1948) Oil on canvas. 63.5 x 76.2 cm. Private Collection

"Skelton Church, Yorkshire" is a prime example of the artist's famous architectural paintings, the late 1940s being a period which Anthony West marks as his most productive years. Piper is celebrated not only for painting some of Britain's best buildings but for capturing their historical and individual characteristics. Piper's aesthetic is often abstracted, so that his recording is not a straight-forward rendition but is more an expression of how a British citizen would feel seeing the destruction. Piper depicted the horrors of war at home painting a picture of life during conflict.