The execution of the doge Marino Faliero by Eugène Delacroix In his paintings, the Romantic artist Eugène Delacroix (1798 – 1863) aimed to capture all the moments and emotions from a story that interested in one scene. A good example of this is The execution of the doge Marino Faliero (1826). The painting is a free interpretation of Byron’s drama with the same title, which was staged in both London and Paris shortly after its publication in 1821. The story takes place in fourteenth-century Venice and is about Marino Faliero, the 53rd Doge of Venice. Faliero had already passed the age of seventy and was – it is said – slightly senile when he was elected. He despised the nobility, who, he thought, looked down on him, and attempted a coup d’etat in April 1355, aiming to take effective power from the ruling aristocrats. The coup failed and Faliero was sentenced to death together with ten accomplices, after which his body was hanged at the Doge’s Palace. In The execution of the doge Marino, Delacroix …

  The Roses of Heliogabalus by Lawrence Alma-Tadema Beautiful Roman ladies relaxing in marble decors, carelessly leaning against an azure blue background or looking out over a calm sea. The interiors of Roman churches, archaeological excavations in Pompeii and everyday, lifelike scenes from classical antiquity take you on a journey to the past. The nineteenth-century Dutch painter Lawrence Alma-Tadema was born in 1836 in the province of Friesland in the north of the Netherlands. In 1852 the young Alma-Tadema went to Antwerp to study at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts there. The Antwerp Academy had a good reputation internationally and attracted a lot of foreign artists, many from the Netherlands. Tadema continued his studies in the studio of Louis De Taeye, who taught courses in history and historical costume at the Antwerp Academy. De Taeye introduced him to history books about the Merovingian period – which would become a lifelong fascination of the artist – and encouraged him to pursue historical accuracy in his paintings. In 1863 Tadema visited Naples and Pompeii, where he witnessed …