Caravaggio - an absolute master of contrast and light. He manages to balance a painterly hand with realism in such a pleasing way. I’ve had the pleasure of seeing some of his works in person, and they’re all just so impossibly smooth and polished.

Ooh, a subject I love!

Number one all-time, Mark Rothko, no hesitation.
From a more classic tradition, JMW Turner and Caspar David Friedrich.
From the French impressionists, Paul Cézanne.
From the Renaissance, Giorgione of Venice.
From antiquity, the wooden tomb portraits of Fayum, Egypt.

Goya, in his blue period, feels very relevant to us today

I discovered this guy on Reddit almost a decade ago. I have a couple prints from him, I love the style of the exploring astronauts. His name is Flooko

https://www.flookart.com/astronaut-and-friends

Probably Zdzisław Beksiński. Not because he paints nice things to look at but rather he paints things that some may call horrible in a very interesting way. I kind of think it makes me appreciated life in a way since it could be so much worse, but I'm not sure if this really describes why I like him. I think this is a collection of most of his paintings

Edit: For nice things to look at I recently took a closer look at Caspar David Friedrichs Landscape paintings.

I really love Dali, and the whole surrealist movement. Just saw two of his paintings over the weekend.

H.R. Giger

For with him there would be no alien

I really like Degas and Monet, and to a larger extent impressionism as a whole. To me their painting transcend vision only and I feel like I can hear the sound and smell the air of the scene depicted. By far my favourite art movement.

I also love Jan Van Eyck and how precise and tangible his paintings are. The Arnolfini portrait and Virgin and Child with Canon van der Paele are what immediately come to mind. Fur, silk, wood, paint, metals, reflections and soft shadows, everything is just incredibly lifelike and three dimensional. The reflection in the mirror in the Arnolfini portrait is also pretty crazy considering the entire thing is about a square foot in size.

There's plenty of others like Caravaggio and Rembrandt for their incredible use of chiaroscuro and depiction of emotions or Hieronymus Bosch with his wild scenes that often look like lsd infused fever dreams.

I didn't get the Picasso until I saw some of his paintings in person. What's even crazier is that he mastered realism by like 10yrs old and thought it was too easy.

Brandon Bird, specifically his seminal masterpiece The Death of Jennifer Sisko and the Destruction of U.S.S. Saratoga at Wolf 359.

Ok I know he called himself an illustrator but I don't care. To me Rockwell is the supreme. The way he could just tell a story with a single image. The way he could just tell you that story the way his target audience wanted to see it.

I got a book of his top paintings once and was looking through it, my wife came home from work and I showed her, then I had to go run an errand. On the way back it clicked in my head: she was going to leaf through the book and stop at the picture of the before and after of the family beach trip. When I get home the book will be on that page. Sure enough it was.

I like Robert Delaunay, and also his wife, Sonia Delaunay. Their work involves a lot of bright, vibrant colors. It also was rather abstract or impressionistic, which I enjoyed. I think I like Piet Mondrian for similar reasons. Jan Sluyters would be another.

I also like JMW Turner a lot. I'm a sucker for lighting and dynamic skies in paintings, and his work features that very prominently. Frederic Edwin Church is another painter along these lines that I really enjoy.

A more contemporary passive that I like is Nina Tokhtaman Valetova. Her work also involves a lot of bold colors.

Gustav Klimt, so much to look at! Also Edward Lear, beautiful birds and landscapes.

I've always loved Edward Hopper. Some version of Nighthawks has been by desktop background for many years.

Mary Whyte is my favorite modern watercolor artist. She does absolutely stunning paintings of people in their environment.

Lucien Freud, Francis Bacon, Phillip Pearlstein, Bronzino, Pontormo, Velasquez, El Greco, Artimesia Gentileschi, Otto Dix, Kathe Kollwitz, Jenny Saville, Zhi Lin

• John Constable
• Pro Hart
• Jeffrey Smart
• Piet Mondrian

Probably Keith haring, certainly he's the only one hanging in my room rn.

Caravaggio. I'm more of a fan of that Era of art, and his paintings are just... mesmerizing when seen in person

Many that I like are mentioned already here, so I'll just add Mark Rothko. His paintings are very simple, but they have such depth and power, especially when you see them in person. They just look out at you, almost like they're pulsing.

Frida Kahlo! The reasons are: vibrating colors, latino/mexican elements and the "rawness" brutality of the elements depicted on her art, without trying to be "cute" at all.

Me, I only display my original paintings and sculptures.

René Magritte is one of my favorites that hasn’t been mentioned yet. Surrealism, minimalism, and conceptual.

Others have mentioned Caravaggio so I’ll add Fragonard. I love his style and I also love how mischievous his subjects can be. For instance, Progress of Love.

I saw paintings by a guy named Cropsey (Jasper Francis Cropsey, apparently) that stuck with me. If you look up his paintings, they might look like whatever ol' random bullshit, but in-person, they're huuuuge and so minutely detailed and fun to study. I never really see his name mentioned much.

Hieronymus Bosch and Francis Bacon.

Willem de kooning. Early 20s, figure drawing instructor said my live sketches reminded him of de kooning. I'd never heard of him. Few years later, in San Francisco moma, stood in front of one of his Woman paintings, entranced. Thus my love of abstract expressionism began.

Rene Magritte

James Gurney. Most famous for the Dinotopia books but also did paintings for National Geographic. Has a bunch of tutorials on his site for just about everything and I own several of his books on painting. Can't recommend him enough!

I’ve always liked Ilya Repin. “Reply of the Zaporozhian Cossacks” is my favorite work of his.

Monet

Picasso

Bruegel the Elder is pretty neat. Not my favorite period of art, but his little details are so incredible.

Monet, Gaughin, Tamayo, Matisse, Vuillard, Hopper, Rembrandt, and Rockwell. That will get you started.

JC Leyendecker

Best known for his commercial works, especially ads for the Arrow Collar company. I love the style and linework. Gorgeous stuff. Interesting personal story too, as a very obviously gay man at a time when that was not safe to express.

Edit: My wife, a painter herself, says hers are Modigliani and Schiele.

I like Matisse a lot

I'm not someone who spends a lot of time looking at art, but I have a couple answers. In my apartment the two paintings I have hanging are Hopper's Nighthawks and Van Gogh's Café Terrace at Night.

Hmmm. Hans Bellmer is probably my favorite overall, but he's better known as a surrealist photographer and illustrator. (His illustrations are almost affordable; I don't know if he's just not that well known, or if his surrealist eroticism isn't to everyone's taste, or what. But his 'puppet' photos are really fantastic and disturbing.)

Second is Egon Schiele, who died far, far too young during the Spanish Influenza epidemic. He was a protege of Gustav Klimt, and, IMO, would have eclipsed him had he lived.

Third is Lucien Freud, who has such expressive brushwork, and was a master of color and composition.

I haven't seen him mentioned yet, but Wassily Kandinsky really does something for me.