Zinaida Serebryakova moved to France in search of work, after the revolutionary peasants plundered her family estate. However, Parisians liked modernist trends, not "romantic realism", the favourite and vivid style of the artist. She went so badly that she had to make paints for herself, as there was no way to buy them. Now her paintings are worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Apart from domestic animals, Pablo Picasso always had many birds. The French photographer and sculptor Michel Sima found a little owl in Antibes and gave it to Picasso. It was brought from Antibes to Paris, and lived in the artist's kitchen, sharing a cage with canaries and doves. The owl had a wild temper and rejected everyone except for Picasso. And the artist, known for his Dove of Peace drawing, also painted owls.

One druggist commissioned Paul Gauguin to paint him a picture. "Only you know what, the point is to make the picture simple and clear," he said. In response, Gauguin, without a long thought, drew the "White Horse". Upon seeing the picture, the apothecary exclaimed: "Monsieur, but this horse is green! Have you even seen green horses?!" "Just recall how everything seems green, when you watch the sunset with half-closed eyes in the evening, sitting in a rocking chair," Gauguin retorted. "Well, no, that wasn't the agreement," persisted the druggist, "I need a picture to admire in the daylight with eyes wide open!" And even Gauguin found nothing to object.

The Russian artist had a legendary exclusive visual memory. One day, into the hometown of Vrubel, Saratov, they brought a large-scale copy of the "Last Judgment" fresco by the great Italian Renaissance painter Michelangelo. The future brilliant Russian artist was just Misha then, he was 9 years old. The boy took pencils and brushes at the age of five, so he hastened to look at the work, housed in the church, together with his father, and for a long time he studied every detail of it, even though his father called him to return home. Afterwards, having retired to his nursery, he reproduced the seemingly impossible for the child composition with masterful precision.

During his forced resignation in 1915, the famous British Prime Minister Winston Churchill fell into such a depression that his wife feared that he would commit suicide. This continued until his relative interested him in painting. Gradually, the Prime Minister not only forgot about depression, but also carried this passion throughout his life.

When Jan Vermeer died, he left behind enormous debts. His widow, Catharina Bolnes, had to transfer ownership of her late husband's masterpiece Painter in his Studio (The Allegory of Painting) to her mother, Maria Thins, to keep it out of creditors' hands. However, a year later it was sold at auction and disappeared for more than 130 years. In 1813, the piece became part of Count Czernin's collection. He bought the painting for an extremely low price, having no idea that it was created by the great master from Delft. The aristocrat thought it was a painting by Pieter de Hooch, whose works cost much more at that time. It was only in the autumn of 1860 that the director of the Berlin museum, Gustav Waagen, recognized The Allegory of Painting as an authentic Vermeer.

The phenomenal Erté (Roman Tyrtov), one of the icons of Art Deco, not only designed exquisite and extravagant clothes for fashionistas, but also wore them. Once, American costume designer Howard Greer met Erté wearing his pyjamas with a hem and collar, simulating ermine. In 1926, he appeared at Paris Opera ball wearing a brocade bullfighter costume of his own design. He decorated a huge cape with fresh roses, which he threw into the crowd, going down the stairs. Erté had this passion for bright clothes and extravagant accessories till the end of his life. He wore his costumes “with a unique grace with which wild cat wears its fur,” wrote one of the journalists.

When Cézanne was passing the Saint-Lazare station on his way home, he met a stranger who asked him to show a sketch he was carrying. Having seen the landscape painting, the pale, skinny young man was amazed with its' unprecedented green colour, freshness, and artistic style. "If you like my trees that much, you can take them!" – said Cézanne. "I have nothing to pay with," answered the artist's new fan. Cézanne gave him the painting for free and both of them left the station completely happy.
Right from the station, happy Paul went to the studio, which he rented together with Renoir and Monet. "I've got a fan!" he solemnly declared from the doorway. That stranger appeared to be the poor composer and musician Ernest Cabaner, who was banned from all the cafés where he tried to play his own music.

The first believed professional art dealer, the famous art patron Paul Durand-Ruel saw his mission in supporting and developing real art, and, importantly, educating the audience. Between 1871 and 1922, Paul Durand-Ruel acquired about 12,000 Impressionist works, including more than 1000 works by Monet, 1500 works by Renoir, 800 works by Pissarro, 400 works by Degas, Cassatt and Sisley, and about 200 arworks by Manet.

A lot of artists tied themselves in knots trying to emulate Kuindzhi's palette. Speaking of the painting Ukrainian Night, Kramskoy wrote in a letter to Repin: "I'm a complete fool in front of this painting. The lighting on the white hut is so realistic that it tiresome for my eyes to look at it, as if it is real..." But the secret of Kuindzhi's palette was easier than it seemed. One day Kuindzhi (who was teaching at the Academy of Arts at the time) invited his friend Dmitry Mendeleev to his class. The latter brought a device estimating the spectral sensitivity of the human eye. Kuindzhi was far ahead of his young students in this indicator. He saw in a different way. Not in terms of creativity, but in the most literal physiological sense.

Apples are the landmark object in the Cézanne’s work. And the friendship of Paul Cézanne and Emil Zola began precisely with apples - the future writer, grateful for Paul’s intercession gave the future artist a whole basket of apples.
"He, Zola, was interested in absolutely nothing. He dreamed. He was absolutely unsociable, a kind of a melancholic destitute. You know, the kind of people guys usually hate. Without any reason, they bullied him. And this was the beginning of our friendship. The whole school, big guys and kids, gave me some kind of a swagger because I did not participate in their ostracism. I didn’t care about them, I came up and talked with him as usual. A nice friend. The next day he brought me a basket of apples. Here they are, Cézanne's apples!"

It was a time of the Paris Commune. Once the artist was mistaken for a spy drawing a plan of the Seine embankments and was nearly drowned there. Quickly gathered onlookers got excited and demanded immediate reprisal for spying. But a miracle happened: the guards decided to shoot Renoir instead of drowning him. The execution was decided to take place in the city hall, but on the way there Auguste suddenly saw a familiar face – it was Raoul Rigault, a fugitive Republican journalist, whom Renoir saved from starvation and capture a few years before. Now Rigault was a police commissioner and a big man; the guards who caught the artist cheerfully sang Marseillaise and let him free.

We are lucky enough to know this artist under such a short name "Picasso". After all, you would say his full name at least for five minutes, and it would be even more challenging to remember it! The full name of Picasso consists of twenty-three words: Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Martyr Patricio Clito Ruíz y Picasso. After the Spanish tradition, Picasso received two family names for the first names of his parents: his father Ruíz and his mother Picasso. Well, it is rather difficult to say why he received such a long font name. Probably, the parents decided to list many deceased and living relatives of the family in it in order to honour their memory.

At age 26, an American portraitist John Singer Sargent had a misfortune of meeting with a model Virginie Gautreau, a Frenchwoman, the wife of a large banker from Paris. The beauty, capable of very extravagant deeds, easily agreed to pose for the artist. But her full-growth portrait in a black dress, favorably emphasizing her curves, caused a real scandal in the Salon: everyone recognized the heroine of the "Portrait of the Lady X". In her profile, decorated with half-moon of the Roman goddess of hunting, the husband of the model saw a hint not at the majestic Diana, but at the hunting "hound", which sniffs, preparing to take the trail. At the behest of Pierre Gautreau, Sargent was accused of sexist attitudes and even immorality. As a result, the artist had to say goodbye to Paris.

The main source of biographical information about Caravaggio – police and court records: there's at least one murder and countless fights under the belt of the Italian genius. One of these recorded fights gives reason to think that Caravaggio was not only a thug who should have been sent to anger management courses, but also a gourmet.
It happened in the tavern. A waiter served Caravaggio and two of his friends a large earthenware dish with eight artichokes: half of them were fried in oil and half – in butter. Caravaggio asked which were which: perhaps for him it was as important as light and shadow. The waiter shrugged and suggested that Caravaggio should sniff the artichokes to find out for himself. Caravaggio immediately leapt up, hit him with an earthenware dish and drew his ever-ready sword.

At one time, Maurits Escher made attempts to translate Bach's works into a graphic language. However, when musicians came to him with a request to illustrate the cover of their new album, he categorically refused. The same cold shoulder received the leader of The Rolling Stones Mick Jagger, who wished to decorate his plate with an engraving "Verbum". However, many musicians did not feel confused about the artist’s position, and they used Escher's drawings without permission, which disturbed him very much.

Passion for birds has become the main dominant of John Audubon's life. He was to manage the lead mines, but once he started drawing birds, he could not live without it, devoting his days and nights to his sketches. This led him to ruin, and Audubon found himself in a debt prison.
After getting free, the artist painted river ships, drew road signs and even taught dance, but continued to create exotic birds in huge albums, where he depicted them almost in half of human growth.

In the White House, they always treated painting with piety. So, during the war of 1812, Dolly Madison saved the portrait of George Washington by Gilbert Stewart. Jacqueline Kennedy borrowed eight paintings by Cézanne from the permanent collection of one of the museums. Hillary Clinton withstood the abstract painting “Mountain at Bear Lake—Taos” by Georgia O'Keefe, while critics assured that the work will break the restrained elegance of the Green Room, created by the paintings of the XIX century. Laura Bush convinced the committee that oversees the art collection of the White House to accept the painting by her contemporary Andrew Wyeth as a gift, although it contradicted the rules: before getting to the White House, the painting must be aged for at least 25 years. Therefore, the collection of the residence contains the minimum number of works of living artists.

The impressionist artist Gustave Caillebotte was better known as a patron of art. Having inherited his father's fortune, he supported still unrecognized artists of the time: he bought works, paid for the workshops (for example, Monet), organized exhibitions and auctions where he exhibited paintings from his own collection and bought them at a high price – a marketing move! His hobby were orchids, yachts building, and textile design. And in the honorary "List of outstanding philatelists" he is listed as the "father of philately", his stamp collection is now in the British Museum. He willed a collection of 68 impressionist works (Pissarro, Monet, Renoir, Sisley, Degas, Cézanne, Manet, etc.) to France, now the paintings are a part of the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia, and the remainder is in the D'Orsay Museum.

The Austrian Dieter Buchhart combined three generations of modernists in one exhibition "The Masters of Modernism: Edvard Munch, Peder Balke and Per Kirkeby", and showed their art quirks. Thus, the Norwegian artist Peder Balke (1804–1884), liked to draw not only with brushes but also with his fingers dipped in water and paint – he got special color transitions this way. And the famous Norwegian Edward Munch (1863–1944) often painted himself somewhere in the background of the picture, denoting his own presence on the canvases.