Matisse was a great free thinking revolutionary, always tirelessly working to create something new, initiative and different. The cut-outs he executed later on in his career have a youthful naivety about them. Bold in his use of colour, along with his fellow artistic colossus Pablo Picasso he sign-posted many of the major developments of the first half of 20th century art. His painting Dance I [left] is probably his most visually recognisable painting. It is full of movement and energy and has been linked with Igor Stravinsky’s concerto the Rite of Spring. However, it is a painting that lacks any depth, facial expression, and is very primitive in its basic use of colour, making it more recognisable as a cave painting than a fine piece of art.

Vincent Van Gogh’s roommate, Gauguin, was one of the great experimental painters of his age. Read certain art books and they will describe Gauguin as Symbolist painter, or in others one of the first of the post French Impressionists. In truth, no ‘ism’ accurately describe Gauguin's unique style of painting. Perhaps best known for his paintings of Tahiti and Tahitian women, Gauguin’s paintings are recognisable through their bold use of colour and long continuous flowing lines. Gauguin was equally adept at both portraits and landscapes, and was true a experimenter when it came to medium, dabling with both woodcuts and watercolours. Much like his roommate Van Gogh, Gauguin was deeply underappreciated whilst he was alive and it was only after his death, when his artworks became popular among art dealers and thus displayed the world over. In 2014 the painting [left] Nafea Faa Ipoipo (When Will You Marry?) [left] was sold for a then world record price, a cool $300 million dollars!

If you walk into any fine art gallery decorated with French impressionist paintings, and some of the paintings depict dancers and ballerinas there is a decent chance you’d be looking a Degas. Around half of all known Degas paintings are of dancers. He was fascinated by the human body and movement, and could depict it quite brilliantly. It was his signature, his passion and his life’s work. The Dance Class [left] was seen as radical for its time, choosing to depict a the backstage life of a rehearsal lesson rather than the main event of the final evening show. The paintings lively colourful brushwork, combined with an astute detailed study of the dancers and their pose and positions is typical of the great artist’s work.

Most great artists are intense figures but Cézanne was no exception. His paintings aim to depict their subject; landscape, still life or portrait, from a multitude of angles with bold brushstrokes of light tones next to dark shades. While his style is unique, it is perhaps best described as a bridge between impressionism and cubism. The Card Players [right] is perhaps one of the most recognisable paintings by Cézanne. A version of the painting was sold to the State of Qatar for £259 million in 2011, making it the third most expensive painting ever bought at auction. The painting on the surface is a simple domestic scene depicting two men gambling, drinking and smoking. Qatar a country that where gambling is illegal and which still practices flogging for drinking alcohol, the choice of purchase by the Qatari royal family is a strange one. Within the painting the table is tilted towards the card player on the left, perhaps indicating the shift of power or who is on top, although it is not immediately apparent.

Pissarro was the father figure of French impressionist painting, a forebear and one of its most prolific. Observed up close, his paintings can appear little more than just a series of manic and seemingly random brushstrokes, but step back a few spaces (if room in the gallery allows) and the pieces of the jigsaw form a wonderfully melancholy masterpiece. As with most impressionists he painted almost exclusively outdoors, and most contain figures working the land or just going about their day-to-day business. He worked with and profoundly influenced this most dominant period of French painting, and no fine art gallery in the world worth its salt is ever sort of a Pissarro or two.

Manet is the first artist of note to move away from the traditional impressionist painters of the Salon, and towards a modern style with a far more earthier realism. Instead of the idealised impressionist landscapes painted en plein air, Manet painted Parisian street life, from both ends of society. The down and outs in The Absinthe Drinker, to the young male dandies hanging out with a naked female figure in Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe (The Luncheon on the Grass). But Manet’s most striking and most memorable painting has to be A Bar at the Folies-Bergère his last great masterpiece. The painting demonstrates Manet’s adept artistic license at its best. Shifting the barmaid’s reflection right and tilting it slightly to allow for a better balance in the composition. The viewer is the man at the bar making his order in the top right corner. The background is a festival of high-culture with the seated audience donned in their Sunday’s finest, watching the entertainment of a trapeze artist shown in the far top left. This painting is utterly spellbounding and Manet at his supreme best.

Renoir is one of the defining and most recognisable of French impressionist painters. He was the favourite amongst the critics Salon and the Impressionist exhibitions of the late nineteenth century, He all but perfected the technique of shorten broken brushstrokes, whose genius can only be properly discerned when the viewer takes a couple of steps back from the canvas. However, unlike a Signac or Sisley, Renoir would blur and therefore soften the lines of paint, creating a dream-like haze among the figures and the landscape. Paintings like Bal du moulin de la Galette [left] executed in 1876, and displayed today in the Musée d'Orsay are typical of his large canvas scenes depicting the French high-society at pleasure outdoors. His paintings remain universally popular, with a potential Renoir painting the subject of a quite brilliant episode of Fake or Fortune which not only highlighted the genius of Renoir but also the high-power disagreements between the so-called experts of the catalogue resume.

Delacroix is often referred to by art historians as one of the last old masters and the first great modern artist. It is an acclaim that is well deserved, with his paintings both finely executed and full of energy with bright colour choices and bold confident strokes. Within his paintings he often chose to depict scenes of both Greek and Roman mythology as well as traditional religious scenes. That being said, Delacroix’s most influential painting came from an event within his lifetime, the French Revolution and July revolution of 1830, which led to exile and abdication of King Charles X. Liberty Leading the People [left] was exhibited in the Salon in 1831, and instantly became a French nationalist symbol of power. Immediately after its exhibition in the Salon, the newly formed French government purchased the painting from the artist for the grand figure of 3,000 francs. However, more unrest during the June 1832 rebellion, meant the painting was hidden in the attic of the Palais du Luxembourg. Post revolution the painting was returned to the artist, and was displayed from 1855 in the Salon once more, before being entering the national collection at the Louvre in Paris in 1874 where it can still be viewed today. Delacroix’s greatest masterpiece remains a powerful symbol of French identity, on a par with the La Marseillaise or good food and fine red wine.

Rodin is the father of modern sculpture, and one of the greatest sculptors to have graced this planet. His works ‘The Thinker’ and ‘The Kiss’ are instantly recognisable, great everlasting masterpieces that have been replicated the world over. Rodin’s greatest skill is in encapsulating real human emotion out of solid marble or stone. The Thinker [left] was originally called the Poet and formed part of Rodin’s huge imposing ‘Gate of Hell’ which he based on the verses from Dante’s Divine Comedy. It shows man in his deepest pensive thoughts, bent over almost in a fetal position, but resting the huge heavy head on his clenched fist. The pose is now so famous it has becoming the symbolic position for man’s deepest thoughts and contemplation.

Painter of the water lilies and the most instantly recognisable of the French impressionist painters. Monet’s house and garden at Giverny is today one of France’s top tourist attractions outside of Paris. Monet’s paintings of his Giverny pad along with those famous water lilies are idealistic chocolate box fancies, that warm the heart on a cold winter’s day. As the founding figure of impressionist painting, and painting en plein air, it seems as if fine topical weather followed Monet wherever he worked. That said, Monet was relentless in his work, producing one of the biggest portfolios of any master artist. He painted London, Paris, Venice and as well as large swaths of the Mediterranean coastline. Most of his paintings have a warm embrace of colour with rich purples and oranges, softening any cooler blues and greens. Also in that quintessential impressionist manner he would blur the edges of objects towards the distance of the painting, and therefore ask the viewer to stand away from the canvas to take the whole picture into view and along with it his undoubted artistic genius.