In emphasizing emotion and imagination, romantic art shifted away from the restraint of classicism and neoclassicism that had dominated art in Europe since the Renaissance. Romanticism achieved its greatest popularity in art, literature, music and philosophy between 1780 and 1830, although its expression of individual experiences ranging from awe to passion informed culture in the decades after.
Landscape painting was especially popular during the romantic period, as were nature studies of wild animals and fantasies of exotic lands. Romanticism varied across Europe as it reacted to the rise of industrialization, a more personal relationship with faith that was distanced from the church and the rationalist thinking of the Enlightenment.
British painters such as John Constable and J.M.W. Turner responded dramatically to the light and atmosphere of the natural world, while William Blake conveyed humanity’s connection to the divine in his visionary art. In Germany, the late-18th-century Sturm und Drang, or Storm and Drive, movement, with its probing of the unconscious, inspired a sense of mystery in work by romantic artists such as Caspar David Friedrich and Philipp Otto Runge. In France, where the French Revolution had turned tradition upside down, Théodore Géricault and Eugène Delacroix used lush brushwork to paint monumental canvases with tumultuous scenes of nature and history.
The romantic movement and its subject matter were a significant influence on the Pre-Raphaelites, Symbolists and the American painters of the Hudson River School, as well as on other cultural movements in the 19th and 20th centuries that saw artists build on this perspective in which art was guided by emotion rather than reason.
Find a collection of romantic paintings, sculptures, prints and multiples and more art on 1stDibs.
"A Gentleman's Daughter" Original Romance Book Cover
Located in Fort Washington, PA
Zebra Books Robert Berran has been a prolific romance and historical book cover illustrator since the 1970s. Signed lower left, and again on the reverse with date. Unframed Canvas...
Canvas, Oil
Speak Only With Your Heart, McCall's Illustration
By Saul Tepper
Located in Fort Washington, PA
Medium: Oil on Canvas Signature: Signed Upper Left This illustration appeared in Edmond War's story, Speak Only With Your Heart, McCall's magazine, 1942. From the Estate of Charles Martignette. Won the Harvard Award in 1929; Newspaper Award in 1936 and was elected to the Society of Illustrations Hall of Fame in 1980. Saul Tepper was born on the Lower East Side of New York City, and remained a New Yorker all his life. As a youngster, Tepper was awarded a correspondence course from the Landon School of Art. He also studied at The Cooper Union, the Art Students League, and at the Grand Central School of Art, under Harvey Dunn. Tepper first worked as a letterer in a fashion catalog...
Canvas, Oil
"Full Personality" Story Illustration, Saturday Evening Post, 1933
Located in Fort Washington, PA
"Full Personality," by John Taintor Foote and illustrated by Henry P. Raleigh for the Saturday Evening Post, January 28, 1933. "I've come to drown myself -- will you help?" Henry Patrick Raleigh...
Board, Ink, Watercolor
Couple Beside a Tree
Located in Fort Washington, PA
Couple standing beside a tree Signed lower right Henry Patrick Raleigh was one of the most prolific of all our illustrators. In spite of this...
Ink, Paper, Watercolor
“Slumming Among the Four Hundred, ” Post Illustration
Located in Fort Washington, PA
Original illustration for the article “Slumming Among the Four Hundred” by Alfred Henry Lewis, for The Saturday Evening Post, published November 2, 1907. The article offers a satiri...
Board, Ink, Paper, Pencil
"Ofreciendo una copa", 19th Century Oil on Canvas by Ángel María Cortellini
Located in Madrid, ES
ÁNGEL MARÍA CORTELLINI Spanish, 1819 - 1887 OFRECIENDO UNA COPA unsigned oil on canvas 13-1/4 x 11 inches (33.5 x 28 cm.) framed: 17-1/4 x 15 (44 x 38 cm.) Ángel María Cortellini. Sanlúcar de Barrameda (Cádiz), 27.09.1819 – Madrid, 1887. Painter. Ángel María Cortellini was born in Sanlúcar de Barrameda on September 27, 1819, to an Italian father and a Spanish and Sanlúcar mother. Contrary to family opinion, he decided to dedicate himself to painting and already, at the age of nine, he was enrolled in a drawing academy in his hometown. They soon sent him to Seville, where he was a disciple of Joaquín Domínguez Bécquer...
Canvas, Oil
View of Ariccia, a preparatory drawing by Achille Bénouville (1815 - 1891)
Located in PARIS, FR
This very modern drawing presents a view of Ariccia, a small town 25 kilometres south-east of Rome. The Palazzo Chigi (in which the film-maker Luchino Visconti would film a large part of The Leopard a century later) and the adjoining church are seen from the bottom of the ravine that surrounds the town. This drawing is a moving testimony to the attraction of the city for artists of the Romantic period, who established in Ariccia a vivid artists' colony. 1. Achille Bénouville...
Ink, Gouache, Pencil
"Courtship", Late 19th Century Oil on Canvas by Sapnish Artist M. Alonso Pérez
Located in Madrid, ES
MARIANO ALONSO PÉREZ Spanish, 1857 - 1930 COURTSHIP signed "Alonso Pérez" (lower left) oil on canvas 23 x 12-1/8 inches (58 x 30.7 cm.) framed: 28...
Canvas, Oil
Attributed to Pierre-Jean Hellemans, Brussels 1787 – 1845, Oil on oak panel
Located in Knokke, BE
Hellemans Pierre-Jean Brussels 1787 – 1845 Belgian Painter A Summer Landscape Signature: Attributed to Hellemans Pierre-Jean Medium: Oil on oak panel Dimensions: Image size 62 x 78 cm, frame size 72,50 x 92,50 cm Biography: Hellemans Pierre-Jean was born on November 21, 1787, in Brussels. He was a Belgian pre-romantic painter of landscapes. He was married with his niece, Jeanne Marie-Joséphine Hellemans (1796-1837). She was a painter of still lifes with flowers and fruits. Hellemans studied at the Acade...
Oil, Wood Panel
Attraction
Located in Barcelona, CT
the beginning of a great love through attraction
Acrylic
Build me a Dream, Paperback Cover
Located in Fort Washington, PA
This illustration was published as the paperback cover of, Build Me a Dream (Silhouette Special Edition series) by Pat Warren, Silhouette Books, 1989 A young man holding a young w...
Oil, Board
Price Upon Request
Rural Tree Study in English Countryside by 20th Century British Landscape Artist
By James Wright
Located in Preston, GB
Rural Tree Study in English Countryside by 20th Century British Landscape Artist, James Wright Signed, Original, Oil on Canvas, housed in a beautiful ornate gold frame. Provenance: Part of the English Heritage...
Canvas, Oil
Price Upon Request
'Black Silk' Romantic Portrait of Woman with Flowers on Black in Black Dress
By Goxwa
Located in Wellesley, MA
Ġoxwa began painting at a very young age in her native land of Malta and eventually enrolled at the Saint Martin School of Art in London. Years later, she moved to Boston and atten...
Oil, Canvas, Wax
Price Upon Request
Gold & Despair
Located in Brooklyn, NY
Gold & Despair is my adaptation of Gustav Klimt’s masterpiece "The Woman In Gold", also known as The Mona Lisa of Austria. Having admired the symbolic art of Klimt since my working days as a fine art restorer at Vienna’s prestigious Conservation Institute (Bundesdenkmalamt) in the 1980’s, I conceived the idea to recreate the jewel of his gilded period with an interpretive lens on the looming darkness of the Holocaust and World War II. As a native of Austria, Salzburg, I have developed an appreciation for Klimt’s art, and Art Nouveau in general. For the last thirty years, I have lived in New York City and worked as a fine art restorer, conservator, and painter as well as in the healing arts. Klimt had executed The Woman in Gold in the span of four years (1903-1907). My own creative process during 2014-2017, reflects my diligent care and thoroughness in rendering the original painting. In 2014, I started with the preparation of the canvas using Klimt’s original size of 54 x 54 inches (167 x 167 cm). For gesso, I used the traditional method of rabbit skin glue and chalk. For the painting, I used oil paints and genuine 23.5 karat gold in various shades, as well as silver leaves, to magnify the brilliant sheen of Klimt’s gold...
Gold Leaf
Price Upon Request
Turtle Man
Located in Santa Monica, CA
Beautiful drawing by enigmatic artist Len Poteshman
Charcoal, Oil