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The Landscapes of the Guru. Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach (1851-1913) was a German symbolist painter & pioneer of the naturist & peace movement. He created a commune based on "life in harmony with nature and rejection of monogamy". It went bankrupt in 2 years. He retired to paint alone
From Disney to obscurity. The original Concept Art for Disney's Fantasia by Kay Neilson (1886-1957) for the famous "Night on Bald Mountain" segment. Neilson worked for Disney for only 4 years but influenced the style of many classics - his final years were spent in poverty.
Stolen Masterpiece predicted in a Hitchcock show! The story of a 1964 episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour called "Ten Minutes from Now" involved the theft of Vermeer's "The Concert". 26 years later it was stolen for real
with 12 other artworks by robbers disguised as police.
YODA was originally a garden GNOME. Hard to believe but The Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back Sketchbook (1980), shows concept art by Joe Johnston & assistant Nilo Rodis-Jamero in which Yoda was conceived as a Tolkien-esque gnome - only later becoming Elf-like in various colours.
Bruno Shulz, was a renowned Polish Jewish writer & artist. His avant garde work explored the grotesque & surreal & the power dynamics between the sexes. He was shot dead by a Nazi officer when he ventured into an Aryan section of his town during World War II with a loaf of bread
Animals in the City. In the book Tales from the Inner Cities, Australian illustrator and writer Shaun Tan turns his unique imagination to "the nature of humans and animals, and our urban coexistence."
You may never have heard of Jozef Israëls - "the most respected Dutch artist of the second half of the 19th century" (1824-1911). He began as an Historical painter but an experience of poverty refocused his art to the depiction of the "poor and humble" with with emotion & pity.
The Limits of the World. Peder Balke (1804–1887) was a Norwegian painter, known for epic paintings of the desolate North Cape of Norway - the point in Europe closest to the Arctic. His art was too bleak for his era & did not sell well. He had to go into business to earn a living
When Van Gogh was 27 & 28 he was a social realist. He was concerned with the lives and plight of peasants & orphans. He ministered to coal miners in Belgium and attempted to be a missionary to workers. He failed in this ambition but developed his vision as an artist.
Cut short by death. In 1826, William Blake (1757–1827) was commissioned to make a series of etchings for Dante's Divine Comedy. Poverty stricken he "is said to have spent one of the very last shillings he possessed on a pencil to continue sketching." Only 7 images were completed.