Step 1 : Introduction to the question "5. Painting: I saw a painting the other day - it was that one with the big-nosed face on sticks, by the chap with the moustache. Which artist's name has slipped my mind?"
...1. Sir Joshua Reynolds
2. Sandro Botticelli
3. Salvador Dali
4. Jackson Pollock
The Surrealist artist Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dal� i Dom�nech (Salvador Dal�) painted the big-nosed face on sticks, officially titled "El sue�o" ("Sleep"), in 1937. In his imagination, he visualised the act of sleeping as a monster supported by the crutches (sticks) of reality.
This charismatic Spaniard's artistic endeavours went beyond painting and included furniture design, jewellery, film, set design, fashion, and performance art. Many of Dal�'s works have disturbing, controversial or socially taboo subject matter, but are nevertheless objects of great imagination and fascinating wonder.
One of Dal�'s quotes, often found in articles summarising his works, expresses the view of both the artist and many admirers of his art - "...just because I don't know the meaning of my art, does not mean it has no meaning...".
Jackson Pollock (1912-1956) was given the epithet "Jack the Dripper" by "Time" magazine in 1956, from his unique style of "action painting". He preferred to use things such as sticks, trowels, knives, and dripping or throwing to apply paint to the canvas. He may even have employed his nose as a painting tool, although this is an unsubstantiated theory.
Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792) was the first President of the Royal Academy of Arts, and painted many portraits, mainly in the Grand Style that idealised the subjects. Noses present in his portraits are all beautifully proportioned and not at all given to action or ambiguous interpretation.
Sandro Botticelli (1459-1510) was an artist of the Florentine school, noted for paintings such as "The Birth of Venus". Close examination of the shapes and sizes of his subjects' noses, particularly in portraits, reveals the refreshing tendency to depict reality or near-reality.