(Poland-France, 18/01/1882 - 17/03/1949) Born in Białystok, then part of the Russian Empire, Exter came of age at a moment of radical artistic transformation. After graduating from Kyiv Art School in 1906 she travelled to Paris to study at the Grande Chaumière Academy where she moved fluidly across stylistic borders, becoming a crucial conduit between the artistic innovations of Western Europe and the emerging Modernism of Eastern Europe and Russia.    In Paris, she encounter

(Ukraine-United States of America, 23/09/1899 - 17/04/1988)  At just 10 years old, Nevelson had already declared her intention to become a professional sculptor and make a career of her favourite childhood toys – the scrap pieces of wood she found at the lumber yard her father operated after the family emigrated from Kyiv to the U.S. in 1905. Moving to New York in 1920, her career began by studying visual and performing art at the Art Students League, although her artistic ou

Developing alongside the Enlightenment’s emphasis on intellect and reason, Neoclassicism was particularly embraced in revolutionary France and the early United States where political upheaval and social unrest found consolation in the virtuosity, sacrifice, patriotism and self-control believed to have been modelled by Greco-Roman civilisations. Archaeological discoveries at Herculaneum and Pompeii, and widely circulated engravings of classical sculpture and scholarly texts pr

Amid Europe’s meteoric technological revolution in the early twentieth century, and the profound urban expansion and social upheaval brought along with it, Expressionism made a final break from Neoclassical and Enlightenment traditions started by the Impressionists half a century earlier. Instead of prioritising visual accuracy and harmonious beauty, Expressionist artists sought to convey a subjective experience through their deliberately intensified visual language of disto

(Germany-United States of America, 11/01/1936 - 29/05/1970) Born in Hamburg, to a Jewish family in 1936, Hesse and her sister were sent to the Netherlands when she was just two years old in an effort to avoid Nazi persecution. Reunited with her family six months later, they eventually settled in New York City where she began her artistic training in 1950. Enrolling in classes at the School of Industrial Art, and later briefly studying at the Pratt Institute, she eventually ea

(Turkey, 07/01/1901 - 05/09/1991) Born Fahrünnisa Şakir in 1901 to an elite Ottoman family, Zeid’s father was a prominent intellectual and diplomat who raised her in an environment steeped in literature, music, intellect and art, and encouraged the pursuit of her creative expression when she began painting and drawing at the age of 14. After beginning her artistic education in 1928 at the Académie Ranson in Paris, she returned to Istanbul the following year and enrolled in cl

(Spain, 05/01/1902 - 06/02/1995) Born Ana María Gómez González in 1912, Mallo grew up between coastal landscapes and urban environments that would provide early encouragement for her avant-garde experimentation, poetic symbolism and radical reimagining of the modern subject — particularly the modern woman. At once rigorous and exuberant, her work places her among the central protagonists of Spain’s Generation of ’27, even as her legacy long remained overshadowed by exile and

Rather than depicting the world as it appears from a fixed viewpoint, as had been the way since the Renaissance some 500 years earlier, Cubists challenged the traditional models of illusionistic depth, linear perspective and chiaroscuro, all of which gave way to fractured planes and shallow spatial fields. Objects were analysed by being broken apart and reassembled in a manner that they could be viewed simultaneously from different angles, providing greater context to its su

(England, 05/01/1893 - 22/12/1975) Known mononymously as Yevonde, her use of colour photography and bold reimagining of portraiture was modern, theatrical and entirely unlike anything being produced by her contemporaries, leading to her photographs remaining striking, even today. Her performative approach to identity, refusal to conform to expectation and confident use of colour photography at a time when it was dismissed, continue to resonate with modern audiences. As both a

(Italy-England, 11/06/1760 - 05/01/1838) Born Maria Luisa Caterina Cecilia Hadfield in Florence, Cosway was raised at the crossroads of European culture, diplomacy and art, leading to her becoming one of the most cosmopolitan and intellectually ambitious artists of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Her father, an amateur art dealer, and her mother both encouraged her precocious artistic talents, enrolling her in drawing, painting and music classes from an ea

(Cuba, 05/01/1896 - 08/04/1968) Born in Yaguajay, Cuba, Peláez del Casal moved with her family to Havana when she was 20 years old and quickly enrolled at the Academia Nacional de Bellas Artes San Alejandro, where she received a rigorous academic training that emphasised drawing and composition. While her early works reflect this foundation, they also reveal a restless curiosity and an emerging desire to move beyond such academic conventions, an ambition that would soon lead

(Tanzania-England, 1954 - ) Widely regarded as a central figure in the British Black Arts Movement of the 1980s, Himid’s work as an artist, curator and cultural activist has profoundly shaped the landscape of contemporary art in the United Kingdom and beyond. Having spent more than four decades interrogating histories of race, representation, erasure and power, she has continuously created vital spaces for artists of African and Caribbean descent to be seen and celebrated.   

Emerging in Italy in the fourteenth century and spreading across Europe over the next three hundred years, the Renaissance was a sweeping cultural movement that profoundly transformed European art and life. Rooted in a renewed study of classical antiquity, Renaissance artists sought to shift away from the symbolic conventions of the medieval world and reconcile the intellectual heritage of ancient Greek and Roman civilisations with the spiritual imperatives of Christian Europ

(Finland, 03/09/1861 - 31/12/1919) As one of the most accomplished Finnish painters of her generation, Danielson-Gambogi’s keen observational eye and compositional clarity, resulted in a body of work that bridges Realism, Naturalism and early Impressionist sensibilities to portray modern life with psychological depth. Born in 1861 in Noormarkku, Danielson-Gambogi demonstrated artistic promise at a young age and pursued formal training at fifteen years old when she enrolled in

(Australia, 11/01/1911 - 30/12/2003) Growing up in an environment steeped in artistic curiosity, from a young age, Heysen was encouraged to take up drawing and painting, and was raised to maintain a disciplined observation of nature. As the daughter of a celebrated artist, public perception of her work was inevitably shaped by her father’s reputation, but nevertheless, she refined her handling of colour and light in order to develop a distinctive voice of her own that led her

Emerging in the early 1920s from the turmoil of World War One, Surrealism sought to liberate creativity from the confines of rationalism and moral convention. Rejecting reality and logic, Surrealist artists turned to Freudian psychoanalytic theories to access their mind’s involuntary mechanisms, specifically their subconscious, in an effort to reveal deeper truths about human existence. Found in their fantasies or nightmares, this was, in part, influenced by the missing-limbe

Distinguishing itself from its Impressionist forbearer by emphasising the subjective expression of emotion and the symbolic content of an artwork alongside its formal design elements, Post-Impressionist artist’s experimentations extended the visual vocabulary of modern painting. Ethel Carrick, Sur la plage (c.1910). Oil on wood panel, 26.5 x 35 cm. Art Gallery of South Australia. Emerging primarily in France but resonating internationally, the movement was not a coherent sch

Much like many movements that came before it, Impressionism was born out of frustration with staunch traditionalism and a desire to break with the institution’s definitions of art. Rejecting the polished finish and historical or mythological subjects favoured by the official Paris Salon, Impressionists sought instead to connect with a world that was rapidly changing around them, and so set out to capture the fleeting sensations of modernity, not just in terms of how it looked

Abstract Expressionism emerged from the upheaval of the inter- and post-war periods in order to redefine the purpose and language of art. Rooted in spontaneity and individual expression, the artists of this movement turned inward, privileging the subjective and the instinctive, leading to their canvases recording the dialogue between a painter’s self, their gestures and the act of creation. This approach elevated the process of creating over the final product and the resultin