The men in the foreground of Rembrandt van Rijn's The Night Watch all carry muskets and wave banners, indicative of militia soldiers in the seventeenth century. The captain, Frans Banning Cocq, was an actual leader of a militia, and Rembrandt intentionally captured his company. It was also intentional on the artist's part to show their supporters behind them.

Figure 3: The Night Watch by Rembrandt van Rijn (1642)

Figure 4: The Astronomer by Johannes Vermeer (1668)

Francisco de Goya became the court painter to King Charles IV of Spain in the 1790s, and made many portraits of the royal family until Napoleon invaded Spain in 1808. This painting, Charles IV of Spain and His Family, was made in 1801, and shows a dynasty trying to keep itself together.

Figure 1: Las Meninas by Diego Velázquez (1656)

Figure 2: Charles IV of Spain and His Family Francisco de Goya (1801)

After the German priest Martin Luther inaugurated the Protestant Reformation in 1519, the Roman Catholic Church made various attempts to reinforce itself. In the mid-sixteenth century, the Counter-Reformation came about, during which Catholicism sought to address the criticisms of the Protestant Reformation while remaining loyally Catholic. Carvaggio's painting of the disciples encountering the risen Jesus at Emmaus is emblematic of this trend, as the work shows shows a realistic, devotional, and personal religion that nonetheless has a focus on mysticism and traditional Church doctrine.

Figure 3: The Annunciation (Cortona) by Fra Angelico (1433)

Figure 4: Supper at Emmaus (Milan) by Caravaggio (1606)

Rembrandt van Rijn, like other Dutch Masters of the seventeenth century, painted different images from other European painters, thanks to the Netherlands' unique religious and political situation. As a Protestant-majority nation that was ruled by the Spanish monarch, court paintings, images of Roman antiquity, and classical mythology were unpopular subjects among the Dutch in the seventeenth century. As such, the most popular subjects for Rembrandt were scenes from the Bible, especially the New Testament.

The lapis lazuli stone was mined in Afghanistan and Pakistan since the seventh millennium BCE. In the early Renaissance, it was finally imported to Europe, where the paint produced from lapis lazuli from the stone became highly valued. This paint was widely used in Renaissance art for the blue robe of the Virgin Mary; it is also widely associated with the Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer.

Impressionists had less of an interest in painting works with religious themes while Baroque artists often engaged with these themes. Impressionism emerged in France while Baroque art gained popularity across Western Europe. Both Impressionists and Baroque artists had an interest in portraiture and the everyday world. Both kinds of artists showed an interest in capturing light on the canvas. 

Rubens derived great insight into European politics from his diplomatic missions, and never ceased to promote peace. He used Allegory of the Outbreak of War to express his horror at the Thirty Years War and promote his message of peace.

Greuze's Village Wife echoes Rousseau's writings, which placed emotions above reason as the most natural of human expressions. The painting's sentimental tone is characterized by the simplicity seen in the peasant's rustic, unadorned dwelling and its depiction of this happy climax to a rural romance. It promotes a moral message that happiness is the reward of natural virtue.

One of the most curious elements of Diego Velazquez' Las Meninas is the inclusion of a small mirror in the middle of the painting, on the back wall of the room, showing the King and Queen of Spain. This directly references a similar object in the Arnolfini Wedding Portrait, painted over two hundred years before Velazquez' creation of Las Meninas.

Image is in the public domain, accessed through Wikipedia Media Commons: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Las_Meninas,_by_Diego_Velázquez,_from_Prado_in_Google_Earth.jpg

Etching such as this one, Self-Portrait with Saskia, served two functions for an artist like Rembrandt. While some would be sold at a much lower cost than large-scale paintings, they also allowed Rembrandt to practice techniques he utilized in paintings. Rembrandt made a large number of self-portraits throughout his career, each of which had different poses, but all showed his hallmarks such as  heightened contrast of light and dark elements and a revealing view of his subject, each of which are showed in this etching.

Image is in the public domain, accessed through Wikipedia Media Commons: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Self-portrait_with_Saskia.jpg