Red Hair in Art: Gaston Bussière

 Gaston Bussière (April 24, 1862 – October 29, 1928 or 1929) was a French Symbolist painter and illustrator.

He found inspiration in the theatre works of Berlioz (La Damnation de Faust) as well as William Shakespeare and Richard Wagner. He became in demand as an illustrator, creating works for major authors. He illustrated Honoré de Balzac's Splendeurs et misères des courtisanes published in 1897, Émaux et camées, written by Théophile Gautier, as well as Oscar Wilde's Salomé. He also illustrated several works by Flaubert.

Elsa and Lohengrin

Juventa

Les iris

Helen of Troy

Brunhild

Tristan and Iseult

Ophelia

Embrace in Evening Light

Leilah

Red Hair in Art: Teodor Axentowicz

Teodor Axentowicz (13 May 1859 – 26 August 1938) was a Polish-Armenian painter and university professor. He was also the rector of the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków.

Axentowicz was born in Brassó, Hungary (now Brașov, Romania), to a family of Polish-Armenian ancestry. Between 1879 and 1882 he studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Munich. From there he moved to Paris, where he started a long cooperation with various journals and started his career as a copyist. He also made numerous travels to London and Rome. In 1893, while he was in London, he married Iza Henrietta Gielgud, daughter of politician Adam Giełgud as well as aunt of Val and John Gielgud of the theatrical dynasty.

In 1895 Axentowicz moved to Kraków, where he became a professor at the local Academy of Fine Arts. He was also active in the local society and cooperated with various societies devoted to propagation of arts and crafts. In 1897 he founded an artistic conservatory for women and soon afterwards became one of the founders of the Sztuka, the Society of Polish Artists.

Throughout his life he had numerous exhibitions, both in Poland and abroad and was awarded many gold medals at both national and international exhibitions.

The red-haired model we see in many of his paintings is Ata Zakrzewska.

Poster for the 2nd exhibition of the Society of Polish Artists "Sztuka" (Ata Zakrzewska)

Wiosna (The Spring, Ata Zakrzewska)

Jesien (Autumn)

Przed lustrem (In front of a Mirror)

Portrait of a Young Woman in Krakòw Costume

Young Lady with Pearls

Rudowlosa (The Redhead)

Portrait of a Lady with a Fur

Rudowłosa 1 (The Redhead, Ata Zakrzewska)

Rudowlosa 2  (The Redhead, Ata Zakrzewska)

Portrait of Sarah Bernhardt in the third act of Tosca

Portrait of Ata Zakrzewska With A Fan

Red Hair in Art: Helene Schjerfbeck

Helena (Helene) Sofia Schjerfbeck (July 10, 1862 – January 23, 1946) was a Finnish modernist painter known for her realist works and self-portraits, and also for her landscapes and still lifes. Throughout her long life her work changed dramatically, beginning with French-influenced realism and plein air painting. It gradually evolved towards portraits and still life paintings. At the beginning of her career she often produced historical paintings.

Schjerbeck's birthday, July 10, is Finland's national day for the painted arts.

Redhaired Girl

Girl Against a Green Background

Fragment

Figure Study

Red Hair in Art: Marianne Stokes

 Marianne Stokes (née Preindlsberger; 1855–1927) was an Austrian painter.

She was born in Graz, Styria and first studied in Munich. Then, having been awarded a scholarship for her first picture, she moved to France. In 1883 she visited Pont-Aven (Brittany, France), where she met the landscape painter Adrian Scott Stokes (1854–1935), whom she married a year later.

The two lived in St Ives (Cornwall) and regularly travelled abroad, frequently to the Tyrol, and in 1905 to Hungary and the High Tatra. Here they spent about half a year sketching and painting in the villages of Važec, Mengusovce and Ždiar. Adrian Stokes concentrated on landscapes, with images of hay-harvesting and picturesque cottages, while Marianne Stokes painted portraits showing the fine detail of the garments. These paintings provide a valuable record of the Slovak culture.

Marianne Stokes was an Associate of the Royal Society of Painters in Water Colours.

The Passing Train

The Garlic Seller

An Angel

A Tearful Child

The Frog Prince

Madonna and Child

Red Hair in Art: Phoebe Anna Traquair

Phoebe Anna Traquair (24 May 1852 – 4 August 1936) was an Irish-born artist, who achieved international recognition for her role in the Arts and Crafts movement in Scotland as an illustrator, painter and embroiderer. Her works included large-scale murals, embroidery, enamel jewellery and book illuminations. In 1920, she was elected as an honorary member of the Royal Scottish Academy.

Phoebe's elder brother was William Richardson Moss, a keen art collector who owned a number of works by Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Traquair shared with her brother this love of art, including a particular fascination with the work of Rossetti and that of William Blake, and her style and choice of subject matter remained deeply influenced by Blake and Rossetti's art and poetry throughout her life.

Phoebe Anna Traquair, Self-portrait

During 1885 and 1886, Traquair created a series of murals for the Mortuary Chapel of the Royal Hospital for Sick Children, Edinburgh. The mural is of Three Maidens (Divine Powers) which is bordered by images within lunettes of writers, artists and critics, such as Edward Burne-Jones, William Bell Scott, Noel Paton and John Ruskin. This was her first work as a professional artist. The work was completed in 1886 and before the building was further developed in 1894, the murals were transferred to a new site and Traquair restored and installed them, albeit in a simpler composition, between 1896 and 1898.

Her murals of the song school of St Mary's Cathedral (1888–92) won Traquair national recognition. Within a tunnel-vaulted interior, the east wall depicts the cathedral clergy and choir. The south wall depicts Traquair's admired contemporaries such as Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Holman Hunt, and George Frederic Watts. 

Salvation of Mankind (detail)

Traquair's best-known work is in the vast former Catholic Apostolic Church (1893–1901) on Mansfield Place (now called the Mansfield Traquair Centre) at the foot of Broughton Street, which has been called "Edinburgh’s Sistine Chapel", and "a jewelled crown". It was this work which "helped to confirm her international recognition."

Traquair was a prolific artist who, as well as her murals and embroidery, produced hundreds of pieces of jewellery. She was invited to exhibit at the World's Fair in Chicago in 1893, and her four silk-embroidered panels The Progress of the Soul were displayed in St. Louis in 1904.

The Red Cross Knight

St. George slaying the dragon (detail)

The four panels of The Progression of the Soul

For more pictures: Wikimedia Commons, Postcard from Scotland: The Embroideries of Phoebe Anna Traquair, Phoebe Anna Traquair by Adèle Geras, Phoebe Anna Traquair at the Art UK site. 

Red-haired Trinities

The Trifacial Trinity (also known as the tricephalous Trinity or vultus trifrons) is a distinct iconography in Christian art depicting the Holy Trinity. It typically presents God as a single body with three heads or, more commonly, a single head with three fused faces. Emerging in the 12th century, this imagery attempted to visually represent the Christian dogma of one God in three persons (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit), but was eventually condemned by the Catholic Church for being "monstrous" and prone to pagan or diabolical misinterpretation.

Trifacial Trinity   The Trinity in Art

Here are some examples of red-haired Trinities.

Church of Santa Maria Assunta in the town of Armeno (province of Novara, Piedmont, near the Lake Orta). Here we have one body and three separate heads.

Church of San Michele in San Salvi (Florence). Detail of a fresco of the Last Supper (1519) by Andrea del Sarto. Here the whole fresco.

Basilica of San Pietro in Perugia

The author of the fresco is unknown (it is probably after the school of Giotto). This is sometimes considered to be a “feminine” Trinity, since the features of the three heads are very delicate and it looks like the beard has been added afterwards.

Church of Santa Maria della Colombata in Perugia

Rocca di Vignola (province of Modena, Emilia-Romagna). Frescoes by Maestro di Vignola .

Church of San Pietro in Benna (province of Biella, Piedmont).

In the chapel that closes the left nave, beneath a terracotta frieze, we find a (rather rare) depiction of the Trinity in the form of a triple figure of Christ blessing. Flanking it are figures of saints (Saint Anthony Abbot and Saint Peter) and female saints (Saint Lucy and Saint Apollonia). These are frescoes by the school of Defendente Ferrari, dating to around 1535.

Monastery of St Peter and Paul, Castelletto Cervo (province of Biella, Piedmont).

Again the triple figure of Christ blessing.