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| Ercole de’ Roberti Head of Mourning Woman ca. 1490 tempera and oil on panel Walters Art Museum, Baltimore |
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| Master of the Half-Lengths Head of a Woman ca. 1540 oil on panel National Gallery, London |
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| John de Critz the Elder Anne of Denmark, Queen of England 1605 oil on panel Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh |
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| Jan Anthonisz van Ravesteyn Portrait of a Woman ca. 1620-30 oil on panel Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio |
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| Nathaniel Thach Woman in Masque Costume 1649 watercolor miniature on vellum Victoria & Albert Museum, London |
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| Giuseppe Nogari Study of a Woman ca. 1740-43 pastel and watercolor National Gallery of Art, Washington DC |
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| Pietro Rotari Sleeping Girl ca. 1760-62 oil on canvas National Gallery of Art, Washington DC |
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| Richard Cosway Portrait of Elizabeth, Countess of Hopetown 1789 watercolor and gouache miniature on ivory Yale Center for British Art |
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| Jean-Léon Gérome Head of an Italian Woman ca. 1843 oil on canvas (painted in Rome) Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio |
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| Charles Edward Perugini I Know a Maiden Fair to See 1868 oil on paper, mounted on canvas Minneapolis Institute of Art |
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| William Merritt Chase Head of a Girl ca. 1880 pastel on brown paper Yale University Art Gallery |
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| Jean-Jacques Henner Head of a Young Woman ca. 1900 oil on canvas Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| André Derain Head of a Woman 1923 oil on canvas Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen |
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| Guy Pène du Bois Head of a Woman ca. 1940-50 oil on paper Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio |
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| Fernando Álvarez de Sotomayor Study of a Woman 1957 oil on board Museo del Prado, Madrid |
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| Frank Auerbach Head of J.Y.M. 1978 oil on canvas Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid |
To One in Paradise
Thou wast that all to me, love,
For which my soul did pine –
A green isle in the sea, love,
A fountain and a shrine,
All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers,
And all the flowers were mine.
Ah, dream too bright to last!
Ah, starry Hope! that didst arise
But to be overcast!
A voice from out the Future cries,
"On! on!" – but o'er the Past
(Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies
Mute, motionless, aghast!
For, alas! alas! with me
The light of Life is o'er!
No more – no more – no more –
(Such language holds the solemn sea
To the sands upon the shore)
Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree,
Or the stricken eagle soar!
And all my days are trances,
And all my nightly dreams
Are where thy grey eye glances,
And where thy footstep gleams –
In what ethereal dances,
By what eternal streams!
– Edgar Allen Poe (1843)