Το Καρναβάλι στην ζωγραφική. The Carnival in painting

Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Le Combat de Carnaval et Carême, The Battle Between Carnival and Lent, 1559, oil on panel, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.

Pieter Bruegel the Elder, The Battle Between Carnival and Lent, The figure of Carnival (detail), 1559

Pierre Bergaigne, A Carnival Ball, 1652

Pierre Bergaigne, A Carnival Parade With Masked Figures

Pietro Longhi, Il Ridotto, 1720-1790, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo, Masks Carnival of Venice with Pantalone, c. 1740-50

Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo, Carnival Scene (The Minuet), between 1754 and 1755

Aleksandr-Petrovic Mjasoedo, Carnival in Rome, 1839

Winslow Homer, Dressing for the Carnival, 1877. Oil on canvas, 50.8 cm × 76.2 cm, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Henri Rousseau, Carnival Evening, 1886

Adrien Moreau, The Carnival Procession, 1887

James Ensor, Carnaval sur la plage, Carnival on the beach, 1887


Νικόλαος Γύζης, Καρναβάλι στην Αθήνα, 1892


Georges Lemmen, Carnival, The Carousel, 1892

Maurice Prendergast, Carnival, Franklin Park, Boston, 1897

Paul Signac, Carnival at Nice

Lyonel Feininger, Carnival, 1908. Carnival, painted in 1908, soon after Feininger had begun to explore painting after a successful career as an illustrator. Photograph: National Galerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin/MMFA

Lyonel Feininger, Carnival in Arcueil, 1911. Feininger's work around this time often included a carnival world with larger-than-life figures in vibrant colours. Photograph: The Art Institute of Chicago; Joseph Winterbotham Collection/MMFA

James Ensor, Carnaval en Flandre, Carnival in Flanders, 1920

Max Beckmann, Carnival, 1920. Beckmann’s work, with its grotesque and distorted figures, epitomised what the Nazis considered to be ‘degenerate’ art. He was dismissed from his teaching post in Frankfurt in 1933. Several of his works were included in the 1937 Degenerate Art show, prompting him to leave Germany for Amsterdam. This work represents the climax of Carnival, a season of fancy dress parties, masked balls and street processions with wild music and dancing. The two figures are based on close friends of the artist, who is possibly represented by the masked clown.

Antonio Donghi, Carnevale, 1923, private collection. WikiArt.

Paul Klee, Carnival in the Mountains, 1924

Joan Miró, Harlequin's Carnival, 1924-25


Francis Picabia, Carnaval, 1924-1927 

Max Beckmann, Carnival: The Artist and His Wife, 1925, Oil on canvas, 63 x 41 in. (160 x 105.5 cm), Kunstmuseum der Stadt, Dusseldorf.

Stephan Lackner writes: "The artist with his young bride Max and Quappi were married in September 1925 are out for an evening's entertainment. They have gone to considerable expense for preparations, and their costumes are chic and amusing. They arrive through the parting flaps of a curtain as if they were stepping onto a stage. Their faces are powdered and made up, and they obviously enjoy the masquerade. Beckmann's usually stern mien has loosened up, his expression is just on the threshold of a smile. He is proud of his pretty wife. Even though they do not touch, the parallelism of their hands conveys a feeling of harmony. The artist and his wife have made up their minds "to belong" and to have a good time. The viewer partakes of their good humor. "The color scheme is of tasteful subtlety. Primary colors are kept to a minimum. The purple, greenish, and russet hues are mixed with great finesse and have a velvety, highly cultured shimmer; in a word, the fabrics look aristocratic. Even the horse is not a makeshift prop, but is a rather luxurious toy to serve only for one evening.

"Quappi, Beckmann's second wife, brought a light note into the tormented painter's life. An excellent violinist, much younger than he, from a well-to-do family, and very much in love, she may have been a distraction for the artist-moralist. Only two years earlier, when Beckmann was asked whether he would paint some war pictures, he replied: "Langst bin ich in anderen Kriegen" (I'm already in different wars). He regarded his art as a spiritual combat. But in 1925, he suddenly seemed to have concluded an armistice with his deeper problems. A great love of life inspired Beckmann at that time, and Quappi helped him to enjoy the present. The Beckmanns were popular with the artistically inclined society of Frankfurt, and Beckmann became the teacher of a master class. It may be noted that later on, when Nazi persecution, exile, hunger, cold, and danger changed their style of living, Quappi remained a most efficient helpmate. "She is an angel," Beckmann said, "sent to me so I could accomplish my work." "In 1925 this lay far in the future. At the moment Max and Quappi are two figures from a new commedia dell'arte: harlequin and a lovely horsewoman with a funny hat.

"Illusion and reality melt into each other; there is no strict borderline between the two worlds, certainly not during carnival time. Beckmann often endeavored to confound the two spheres. Painting carnival and circus scenes, masquerades and costume parties, he found a whimsical way of philosophizing: Don't trust appearances, things and people are not what they seem to be. But Beckmann was willing to adhere to the rules of society's game-especially when it was an amusement."

Jose Gutierrez Solana, The Carnival, 1928

Felix Labisse, Grand carnival Ostendais, 1934 

Max Beckmann, Carnival, oil on canvas triptych, 1943

John Thiering, Carnival Of Animals

Ari Roussimoff, Carnival in Miami, 2004. One of the most picturesque areas in Miami Beach is called Espanola Way. In this work I used the sensuous, almost exotic neighborhood setting as a backdrop for a Carnival, timeless in spirit. This area with its unique old-world Spanish architecture added much to what I see as Miami Beach's European aura. In this composition I placed a host of figures from the carnival, the circus and the sideshows. There are Jesters, dancing Pinheads, a Bearded Lady, Jo-Jo the Russian Dog Faced Man, a Magician as well as the great 17th century Spanish old master Velasquez, Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.