Vincent van Gogh's life and work are so intertwined that it is hardly possible to observe one without thinking of the other. Van Gogh has indeed become the incarnation of the suffering, misunderstood martyr of modern art, the emblem of the artist as an outsider. An article, published in 1890, gave details about van Gogh's illness. The author of the article saw the painter as "a terrible and demented genius, often sublime, sometimes grotesque, always...

Renoir became hugely popular despite great obstacles: thirty years of poverty followed by thirty years of progressive paralysis of his fingers. Despite these hardships, much of his work is optimistic, even joyful. Close friends who contributed money, contacts, and companionship enabled him to overcome these challenges to create more than 4,000 paintings. Renoir had intimate relationships with fellow artists (Caillebotte, Cezanne, Monet, and Morisot),...

Henry Tanner (1859-1937) trained under Thomas Eakins in Philadelphia, then left his native U.S. in 1891 for Paris; a proud, quiet individualist determined to surmount racism, he would spent most of his life in France, serving as a beacon to the Harlem Renaissance. Tanner's sensitive, naturalistic animal studies, modernized reinterpretations of biblical themes, subdued yet powerful WW I scenes and brooding, mystical oriental pictures had an impact...