Guide

A guide to painting styles

Not sure which style belongs on your wall? Here's a plain tour of the movements we paint: where each one came from, the painters who defined it, and the kind of home it settles into best.

Impressionism — for example, The Monet Family in Their Garden by Édouard Manet

The Monet Family in Their Garden — Édouard Manet

1860s–1880s · France

Impressionism

It began when a handful of Paris painters left the studio for the open air, chasing daylight with quick, broken strokes. The official Salon rejected them, so they staged their own shows. The name came from a critic mocking Monet's “Impression, Sunrise”.

Defining painters: Defining paintersClaude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, Camille Pissarro
Suits a home that's: Suits a home that'sLight, airy and unfussy. Think Scandinavian, modern-coastal or soft-minimalist rooms where a sunny canvas has space to breathe.

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Post-Impressionism — for example, Wheat Field with Cypresses by Vincent van Gogh

Wheat Field with Cypresses — Vincent van Gogh

1880s–1900s · France

Post-Impressionism

The generation after Impressionism kept the bright palette but stopped merely recording what they saw. They pushed into bold colour, thick paint and private feeling, each in their own direction: Van Gogh's swirling energy, Cézanne's blocks of form that cracked open modern art.

Defining painters: Defining paintersVincent van Gogh, Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, Georges Seurat
Suits a home that's: Suits a home that'sWarm and full of character. Mid-century modern, eclectic and bohemian rooms take strong colour well.

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Baroque & the Old Masters — for example, A Maid Asleep by Johannes Vermeer

A Maid Asleep — Johannes Vermeer

17th century · Europe

Baroque & the Old Masters

A theatrical age of deep shadow and dramatic light (chiaroscuro), rich fabrics and charged emotion. Painters worked for courts and churches, staging scenes that reach out and grip the viewer.

Defining painters: Defining paintersCaravaggio, Rembrandt van Rijn, Diego Velázquez, Johannes Vermeer
Suits a home that's: Suits a home that'sFormal and timeless. Traditional studies, dark-academia libraries, dining rooms that want some drama.

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Dutch Golden Age Still Life — for example, Still Life with a Skull and a Writing Quill by Pieter Claesz

Still Life with a Skull and a Writing Quill — Pieter Claesz

17th century · The Netherlands

Dutch Golden Age Still Life

In the wealthy Dutch Republic, painters took ordinary things (glassware, silver, fruit, a guttering candle) and turned them into quiet arguments about abundance and death, painted with almost unbelievable precision.

Defining painters: Defining paintersWillem Claesz Heda, Pieter Claesz, Clara Peeters, Willem Kalf
Suits a home that's: Suits a home that'sClassic and intimate. Refined dining rooms, moody kitchens, panelled studies.

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Renaissance & Classical Portraiture — for example, Madame Jacques-Louis Leblanc by J. A. D. Ingres

Madame Jacques-Louis Leblanc — J. A. D. Ingres

15th–19th century · Europe

Renaissance & Classical Portraiture

From the Renaissance onward, portraiture became the art of presence: balanced composition, light modelled with care, and a sitter who still meets your eye centuries later. The neoclassical masters later sharpened it into a cool, linear perfection.

Defining painters: Defining paintersHans Memling, Raphael, J. A. D. Ingres, Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun
Suits a home that's: Suits a home that'sElegant and considered. Traditional and transitional interiors, formal entryways, hallways.

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Romantic Landscape — for example, The Harvesters by Pieter Bruegel the Elder

The Harvesters — Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Late 18th–19th century · Europe & America

Romantic Landscape

Romantic painters made nature the main character: vast skies, turning weather, light doing something extraordinary. Landscape stopped being a backdrop and became the emotional heart of the picture.

Defining painters: Defining paintersJ. M. W. Turner, John Constable, Théodore Rousseau, the Hudson River School
Suits a home that's: Suits a home that'sGrounding and natural. Rustic and farmhouse interiors, plant-filled rooms, quiet bedrooms.

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Composition VII — Wassily Kandinsky

Early 20th century · Europe

Abstract Art & Modernism

Around 1910 artists stopped depicting the world and let colour, shape and line carry the meaning themselves: Kandinsky's musical improvisations, Mondrian's grids, Malevich's bare geometry. It's still the language modern design speaks.

Defining painters: Defining paintersWassily Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, Kazimir Malevich, Paul Klee
Suits a home that's: Suits a home that'sClean and contemporary. Minimalist, Bauhaus, mid-century and monochrome rooms that need one bold focal point.

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