The year was 1919, the locale was Soviet Russia, and the mood was positively revolutionary. Luckily for him, Dziga Vertov was on the right train, filming Soviet Chairman Mikhail Kalinin on a propaganda tour. As a young filmmaker and theoretician, Vertov was at the forefront of a roaring debate a

Collage, In-your-face, Intense, Kinetic, Pioneering, Social revolution, Soviet montage

What would the Baroque have been without Rubens? This dynamo of artistic energy infiltrated all the great courts of Europe, spreading the lush, riotous, regal style that had formed in the wake of the Renaissance. His sprawling canvases depict life on an epic scale, as if he needed extra room to inclu

Baroque art, Dramatic, Dreamy, Ecstatic, Fantastic, Intense

The black and white tile piazzas of Italy inspired the work for which Riley is most famous -- an Op Art succession. Caught in a downpour, she noticed how the appearance of the checkerboard tiles shifted and blurred as the water streamed over them. From that point on, she explored the act of looking.

Event, Illusive, Intense, Op art, Physical force, Psychedelic

Love and war may be huge themes, but Sebastian Faulks approaches them from a microscopic perspective. He detects love in the minute movements of a woman's fingers; in a man's manner of crawling through trenches, he captures fear and torment. Faulks is involved in a romance with detail, charging every

Epic, Intense, Pathos, Realist fiction, Sensual, Violent