Cecil Kennedy | Still Life

Victor Gilbert | Academic /Genre painter

The mid-nineteenth and early twentieth century saw the introduction of art based on daily life, a depiction of everything from the street vendors to the homeless in and around France. Artists were often deeply embroiled in the social issues of the time and sought to free themselves from the imposing historicism that had stifled art production for decades.

The movement known as "Realism" found supporters in the progressive art critic Jules Castagnary and artists such as Victor Gilbert promoted a realistic display of modern life in its many permutations.
Gilbert became one of the artists who carried Realism further into the twentieth century and who also fell under the influence of the Impressionist movement by searching for new methods of representation, often less gritty than his earliest work.

Helene Knoop, 1979 | Figurative / Narrative painter

Helene Knoop has studied under Odd Nerdrum and became part of the renowned “Nerdrum School” where philosophical ideas are as equally important as the handcraft.

She is a painter who values sincerity and handcraft above irony and originality. And her paintings are for everyone and for eternity.
A six-pages article showing her work and interview was published in the flight magazine, Scanorama in 2004. Good sales results and publicity have been achieved at her solo-exhibitions.

Her last solo show was in 2005, at Amells Gallery in London.

In Helene Knoop’s pictorial universe we are confronted with an aesthetic which is in sharp contrast to what today is considered “True Art”.

Canaletto | London paintings, 1746-1755

The revered Venetian landscape painter Giovanni Antonio Canal (28 October 1697 - 19 April 1768), known as Canaletto, enjoyed a roaring trade from English visitors to Italy in his early career, but by 1740 the War of the Austrian Succession had taken hold and tourism was dwindling. In 1746, Canaletto decided to move to London to be closer to his market.

At this time Britain was flourishing under newfound wealth.

Canaletto - A self-portait with Saint Pauls in the Background, 1746

Eugene Galien-Laloue | Paris painting

French painter Eugène Galien-Laloue (1854-1941) was born in Paris on 1854.

He was a populariser of street scenes, usually painted in autumn or winter.

His paintings o f the early 1900s accurately represent the era in which he lived: a happy, bustling Paris, la Belle Époque, with horse-drawn carriages, trolley cars and its first omnibuses.

Galien-Laloue's works are valued not only for their contribution to 20th century art, but for the actual history, which they document.