La Première Pose (1900)

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse: La Première Pose

Danae (1900)

Carolus-Duran: Danäe

Danäe is depicted here locked away from the reach of all men by her father - well, almost - and down from the roof comes Zeus in the shower of gold.

In Greek myth, Danäe was the royal daughter of Acrisius, an ancient king of Argos. After an oracle warned her father that Danäe's son would someday kill him, Acrisius had his daughter shut up inside a sealed room, atop an impenetrable bronze tower, away from all men. However, Zeus -- the amorous and all-powerful king of gods - desired Danäe. He came to her through the roof of the sealed chamber, in the form of a shower of gold that poured down into her lap. As a result of this union, Danäe had a son - Perseus - the hero who later took on the chilling Medusa. [John Singer Sargent Virtual Gallery]

Femme En Deshabillee Verte (1899)

Pierre Carrier-Belleuse: Femme En Deshabillee Verte

The Idea of Evil (1899)

Ernest Normand: The Idea of Evil

A Water Nymph (1898)

Léon Jean Basile Perrault: A Water Nymph

Nymphs in a Forest (1898)

Adrien Henri Tanoux: Nymphs in a Forest

The Terrace of the Seraglio (1898)

Jean-Léon Gérôme: The Terrace of the Seraglio

Admiration (1897)

William Bouguereau: Admiration

The "child" is in fact Cupid (he's got wings and is holding an arrow), which makes this appropriate for Valentine's Day!

La Primavera (1897)

Fernand le Quesne: La Primavera

The Folly of Titania (1897)

Paul-Jean Gervais: The Folly of Titania

The Wave (1896)

William Bouguereau: The Wave

The Daughters of Atlas (1896)

Paul Alexandre Alfred Leroy: The Daughters of Atlas

Traditionally known as the Pleiades, the seven daughters of the titan Atlas and the sea nymph Pleione were nymphs in Artemis' train and, together with the seven Hyades, were the caretakers of the infant Bacchus. When Atlas was forced to hold the heavens on his shoulders, Zeus transformed the Pleiades into doves, then stars, to keep their father company in the sky (and to keep the daughters away from desiring men). Beyond the evident beauty of the maidens, Le Roy's work lacks a direct narrative connection with the mythological tale—or the work of Le Roy's fellow artists, such as William Bouguereau, who painted the daughters in more expected ways, floating in a star-filled sky, their loose tresses covering their supple bodies. Rather than employing Greco-Roman overtones, Le Roy's Pleiades are dark-haired huntresses, wearing cloth woven with tribal patterns, keenly watching for prey, waiting to release sharp arrows and long spears to add to their kill of a young gazelle. Contemporary audiences appreciated this mixture of exotic beauty and wild strength and how the work's Orientalist elements innovated the well-known tale and its visual tropes. The writer Thiébault-Sisson thrilled over Les Filles d'Atlas, "girls who dominate the plains" set against a realistically depicted arid desert, "orientalist landscape" that demonstrated Le Roy's "understanding of the Algerian environment that he loved. All is executed in a harmonious and soft quality, and one wonders at the marvel of the nudes with their fresh and pink complexions". [Sotheby's]

Leda and the Swan (1895)

Jean-Léon Gérôme: Leda and the Swan

Spring Breeze (1895)

William Bouguereau: La Brise du Printemps [Spring Breeze]

Hébé (ca. 1895)

Emile Carolus-Duran: Hébé

Truth Coming out of the Well (1895)

Jean-Léon Gérôme: Truth Coming out of the Well, 

Armed with a Whip to Punish Mankind

Monday morning usually greets the world like the woman in this painting by Jean-Léon Gérôme.  The figure of truth emerges from a well holding a scourge with which to shame and punish humankind.  The image makes literal reference to a saying by the ancient Greek philosopher Democritus (ca. 460 BC – ca. 370 BC): “Truth lies at the bottom of a well."  Some have interpreted the painting as a reference to the Dreyfus affair, while others discuss the it in the context of a quote by Gérôme that "thanks to photography, Truth has finally left her well.” – [WTF Art History]

Time Flies (1895)

Édouard Joseph Dantan: Time Flies

After the Bath (1894)

William Bouguereau: Après le Bain [After the Bath]

The Knight of the Flowers (1894)

Georges Rochegrosse: The Knight of the Flowers

From the moment they were created, the operas of Richard Wagner aroused great admiration, particularly from the artists of the Symbolist generation who took many of his subjects as inspiration for their paintings. Thirsting after an ideal, they were overwhelmed by the power of this musician who brought the great myths and old legends back to life. When Rochegrosse painted The Knight of the Flowers he was pursuing his ambition to move closer to the refined and elitist aesthetic of the Symbolists, and to take advantage of the huge popularity of the English Pre-Raphaelites at that time. In 1894, the year when the The Knight was exhibited at the Salon, he also designed, with Francis Auburtin, the sets for the play The Sleeping Beauty, presented at the Théâtre de l'Oeuvre, with costumes by Edward Burne-Jones. So it is not surprising to see him take his inspiration from Parsifal (1882) for this painting.

Rochegrosse depicts the moment when Parsifal, the chaste hero destined to find the Holy Grail, has just struck down the guardians of the castle of the magician Klingsor. He moves away into the enchanted garden, deaf to the calls of the flower maidens, femmes fatales scantily clad in narcissi, peonies, roses, irises, tulips, violets and hydrangeas.

Compared to the majority of Wagnerian paintings that are often rather dark and tragic, this view is quite unexpected. Perhaps fearing criticism, Rochegrosse explained in the Journal des Débats of 2 June 1894 that he had intentionally distanced himself from the opera libretto in order to represent "the central idea of the scene": this human being who was immune to temptation because he was "obsessed with the ideal". Eventually he received critical acclaim, and the State bought the work for the Musée du Luxembourg. Rochegrosse had adapted his work perfectly to the tastes of the time by painting a picture that looked modern: he tackled a Symbolist subject in a Realist style, adding a touch of Impressionism in his treatment of the landscape and vegetation. Moreover, the very graphic interpretation of temptation gives the whole image a carnal dimension that the public could not have failed to notice. [Musée d'Orsay]

After the Bath (1894)

Paul-Louis Bouchard: After the Bath

Those shoes!