CategoriesStyles and Movements
Iconic Works of Art History
Paintings, sculptures, buildings and images that became fixed reference points for later artists and viewers, from the Parthenon to the modern poster.
No works indexed yet · 6 related artists
No open-access works for Iconic Works of Art History are in the index yet. They will appear here as more collections are indexed.
About
Some works become fixed points in the way art is taught and remembered: copied, quoted by later artists and reproduced far beyond their original setting. The Parthenon in Athens, designed by Iktinos and Kallikrates in the 440s BC, became a touchstone of classical architecture, a language Inigo Jones brought to England in the Banqueting House in London (1619–22).
Around 1400 Claus Sluter's Well of Moses near Dijon gave carved prophets startling individuality, and Melchior Broederlam's painted altarpiece wings for the same monastery helped shape early Netherlandish painting. Martin Schongauer's engravings of the 1470s and 1480s circulated across Europe and impressed the young Albrecht Dürer. Popular images can enter the canon too: James Montgomery Flagg's 'I Want You' poster of Uncle Sam (1917) has been imitated ever since. Which works deserve such status is itself argued over, and the list shifts as art history widens its view.
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