Art Stories

Stories behind the art: extraordinary artworks, the stories they hold, and ways to make them yours.

A young woman in a red dress stands at a window, one hand on the sill, looking straight at the viewer.

Renaissance portraits of women: 14 faces from the 1400s and 1500s

Botticelli, del Sarto, Cranach and the court painters of Flanders and France: fourteen portraits of women from the Renaissance, who they were and what their clothes tell us.

Art & Artists

A young woman reads a love letter by golden light while her father watches from behind a curtain.

What art goes with blue walls? 12 paintings that glow

Gold, honey, amber and coral are blue’s natural partners. Twelve paintings by Turner, Böcklin, Blake, Rubens and Guardi that glow against a blue wall.

Rooms & Decor

The dark trunk of an old plum tree with white blossoms in the foreground, with visitors under a red sky behind.

Japanese woodblock prints: 20 ukiyo-e masterpieces

Hiroshige’s snow and fireworks, Utamaro’s beauties, Harunobu’s lovers and Kuniyoshi’s warriors: twenty Japanese woodblock prints, how they were made, and how to hang them.

Art & Artists Japanese art

A long Christmas table laid with food and glasses, with candles and a great fire, and family members gathered around.

Christmas mantel decor: 12 winter paintings to hang above the fire

Carl Larsson’s Christmas Eve, Queen Victoria’s tree, a Danish tree market and Courbet’s snowy village: twelve festive paintings for the season’s most important wall.

Rooms & Decor

Salvator Rosa looks out sternly from deep shadow, wearing a dark cap and cloak.

Famous self portraits: 12 artists who looked in the mirror

From Rembrandt frowning at 24 to Böcklin listening to Death play the fiddle, twelve self portraits that show how artists saw themselves, and how to hang one at home.

Art & Artists

A knight in armour embraces his two daughters as their ransom is counted on a table.

Blue wall art: 12 paintings from sky blue to deep navy

Manet’s seaside, Blake’s Dante, Homer’s open skies and Hiroshige’s fireworks: twelve paintings in every blue, from powder to midnight.

Rooms & Decor

A field of red poppies under a pale blue sky, with a row of green trees and low hills in the distance.

Impressionist paintings: 20 works full of light

Monet’s poppies, Renoir’s riverside lunch, Morisot’s dining room and Pissarro’s village: twenty impressionist works, what makes each one sing, and how to bring them home.

Art & Artists Impressionism

Farmers plough the fields beside a large farmhouse, framed by tall trees under a cloudy sky.

Mantel decor ideas: 12 paintings for above the fireplace

A Brueghel farm, a Stubbs spaniel, a Ruysch bouquet and a Manet portrait: twelve paintings that hold the most important wall in the room, with how to hang them.

Rooms & Decor

Horse portraits from a photo, in the tradition of Stubbs

Ten great horse paintings, by Stubbs, Géricault, Wouwerman, Paulus Potter and Alfred de Dreux, each the masterwork behind a Fable portrait style for your own horse.

Art & Artists