Eyes are the mirror of the soul, so it's no wonder that artists have always paid so much attention to them in their paintings. In this article we will present a selection of the most beautiful eyes in the history of painting, and at the same time tell you what is so special about these portraits, why they were recognized as true masterpieces.
John Everett Mille. The sweetest eyes ever seen
Pre-Raphaelite artist John Everett Mille painted a picture that he called "The Sweetest Eyes Ever Seen" without too much doubt. All honest and from the heart, the girl in the picture is really very cute, and manage to convey a look in which there would be so much gentleness, kindness, and childlike interest in life is worth a lot and testifies to the extraordinary skill of the artist.
Sandro Botticelli. The Birth of Venus
Sandro Botticelli in 1486 was hopelessly in love with a girl of wonderful beauty Simonetta Vespucci, recognized as the first beauty of Florence. She conquered many with her soft character, incomparable beauty and natural charm, but best of all others glorified in the centuries of "incomparable Simonetta" Sandro Botchitelii in his paintings. Renaissance artists held equality between spiritual and physical beauty, so Venus, although nude and considered the goddess of love and beauty, represents chastity and purity, which at that time were the highest virtues.
Sandro Botticelli. Birth of Venus. fragment
The face of Venus, with its meekness and humility, resembles the image of the Madonna, but the perfect proportions of the body and bashful pose is taken from ancient Greek sculptures. Thus, combining all the best that was in art at the time, Botticelli created a truly unforgettable image.
William Bouguereau. My Baby
Academician William Bouguereau in 1878 painted a picture where the level of "cuteness" and sentimentality is off the scale - "My Little Girl". Like many of his paintings, it is on the verge of notoriety, but does not cross it - helps impeccable drawing technique, which has always been famous for Bouguereau. This is not a portrait, but rather a certain ideal image of a "good girl", looking at which involuntarily want to smile, say something good to her and stroke her head. Perhaps the girl's eyes, based on the proportions of her body, resemble the eyes of Japanese anime characters, but at that time they had no idea about it, although Europeans were already familiar with the artwork of Hokusai and other Japanese artists in the ukiye style. So this is clearly a discovery of Bouguereau himself, and not some plagiarism.
William Bouguereau. Dryad
However, Bouguereau was well able to depict not only innocent little girls, but also beautiful girls under the "fig leaf" characters of ancient myths and legends. So Bouguereau was quite the charmer.
Well, perhaps the most memorable eyes are the eyes of the Swan Princess in the painting by Mikhail Vrubel. It is believed that the artist posed his wife Nadezhda Zabela when she played the Swan Princess in Rimsky-Korsakov's opera "The Tale of Tsar Saltan", but in that picture there are more differences than similarities, so it can be called a portrait with a big stretch. It is entirely Vrubel's own image, inspired by his ideas about the otherworldly ephemeral beauty of the Swan Princess, a wise and beautiful sorceress capable of creating real miracles.
Mikhail Vrubel. The Swan Princess.
She is depicted at the moment of transformation into a swan, and her wings - weightless and airy, painted in sharp, jerky strokes, occupy the entire foreground of the painting. But the main thing is the eyes, huge and bottomless, in which it is better not to look at all - you will drown, and it is not clear what they promise - perdition or great reward.
And what eyes in paintings in your opinion the most expressive - write in the comments.
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