How Can We Engage?

Sandro Botticelli, The Birth of Venus (c.1486)

This well-known piece by the Florentine maestro from the 15th century has been widely cited, imitated, and parodied innumerable times. The legendary Venus by Botticelli, born of the sea, is the non-Christian Renaissance painting’s radical naked embodiment of the neoplatonic idea of divine love.

Claude Monet, The Beach at Trouville, 1870

On his honeymoon with his first wife Camille, Monet painted The Beach at Trouville, which features his wife and her female companion. Little to no detail is depicted in the artwork, which instead concentrates on lighting and shadows. Additionally, the Impressionist’s bold brushstrokes successfully capture the coastal air, creating a work that brims with dimension and movement. This artwork is one of Monet’s five beach landscapes painted during the summer of 1870.

Mary Cassatt, Children Playing on the Beach, 1884

American Impressionist Mary Cassat is renowned for her representations of maternal and child love. The two young girls in Children Playing on the Beach are completely absorbed in what they are doing, which makes the picture a strong representation of the popularity of naturalism at the period.

Paul Gauguin, Tahitian Women on the Beach, 1891

Paul Gauguin, a French painter, is well-known for his depictions of Tahiti, a Polynesian island. The artist first emigrated to Tahiti to seek a simpler, more liberated life away from modern France. He resigned his work as a stockbroker in order to focus only on his painting. The painting’s two figures both avoid eye contact with the artist and each other, appearing to be lost in melancholy.

Salvador Dalí, The Persistence of Memory (1931)

One of Dali’s most well-known works is undoubtedly the iconic melting clocks painting, but a little-known truth about it is that the painting’s coastal setting is partially based on Cadaqués beach in Catalonia, a place the surrealist artist frequented as a young boy.