Painted from a hill overlooking the Italian town of Olevano Romano, this oil sketch presents a panoramic view of stucco buildings, the rustic countryside, and the distant ruins of a castle at the right. Along the bottom of the painting, Albert Bierstadt recorded the names of nearby locations and later used them as reference points for a larger painting based on this sketch.
View object. This cloth features five repeated motifs: hat, snake, leaf, chicken, and hand. The hat dzegba refers to that worn by a ritual specialist. The snake references a deity Da. Like several neighbors of the Akan of southern Ghana, Ewe peoples also possess a rich tradition of visual language involving not only proverbs but metaphors, riddles, poetry, and song. Bixby Trust for Asian Art The upper layer of vermilion lacquer has been worn down to reveal hints of an undercoat of black.
This subtle decorative effect of red and black is one of the distinguishing qualities of the lacquer style produced by Negoro-ji, a Buddhist temple known for making utilitarian vessels for monastic and daily use. A bird in flight bursts out of the tree at left, and wagons, farmers, and livestock dot the low-lying fields in the middle ground.
Closer at hand, a man and woman fish quietly on one side of a pond. Deeply buried in the foliage along the opposite bank a pair of lovers, almost invisible to the naked eye, flirt in the darkness.
Rembrandt van Rijn explored and celebrated the countryside of his native Netherlands. Mail is one of the oldest forms of metal body armor, dating well before the birth of Christ.
