Artists
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti (1475-1564) –  Italian Renaissance sculptor, painter, architect and poet. His artistic versatility was of such a high order that he is often considered a contender for the title of the archetypal Renaissance man, along with his rival and fellow Florentine Leonardo da Vinci. (http://www.michelangelo.com/buonarroti.html)

Raphael (1483-1520) – Italian Renaissance painter and architect; celebrated for his clarity of form, perhaps best known for his paintings of the Madonna. (http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/raphael.html)

Titian (ca. 1485-1576) – Italian late Renaissance painter, regarded as the leader of the Venetian school; adept at landscapes, portraits and religious subjects. (http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/titian.html)

El Greco (1541-1614) – Cretan-born painter, sculptor, and architect who settled in Spain and is regarded as the first great genius of the Spanish School. He was known as El Greco (the Greek), but his real name was Domenikos Theotocopoulos. His characteristic style  depicted figures elongated into flame-like forms and usually painted in cold, eerie, bluish colors express intense religious feeling. (http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/greco/)

Diego Velazquez (“Bell-ath-kweth”) (1599-1660) – regarded as Spain’s greatest painter; highly developed individual style; possibly had more influence than any other European painter of the time. (http://www.cyberspain.com/passion/velazq.htm)

Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) – Flemish Baroque painter, probably the most popular of his time; Baroque style emphasized movement, color and sensuality. (http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/rubens_peter_paul.html)

Francisco de Goya (1746-1828) – Spanish artist whose paintings, etchings and drawings reflected contemporary historical upheavals and influenced many 19th and 20th century artists. (http://www.cyberspain.com/passion/goya.htm)

Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) – French landscape painter; one of the first artists to be known as a Realist (vs. Romantic), interested in the direct observation of nature. (http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/courbet_gustave.html)

Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) – French sculptor whose strong and realist works had a profound influence on 20th century art. He was commissioned in 1891 by the Société des Gens des Lettres to create a statue of the French realist poet and novelist Honore de Balzac (1799-1850). He did several versions of the sculpture, finalizing his study in 1896. During the following year it caused a sensation because of its association with an erected phallus. In fact, he had actually created a nude study of Balzac with an erect penis in his left hand before he covered the figure with a (sculpted) cloth. It was eventually rejected by the Société. (http://www.musee-rodin.fr) (http://www.rodinmuseum.org)

Henri Matisse (1869-1954) – French artist known for his use of vivid color and original draftsmanship; one of the “fauves,” he was influence by the work of Gauguin and Van Gogh, among many others. He was a friend an rival of Picasso; they painted the same subject matter, although Picasso is said to have worked more from his imagination and Matisse from nature. (http://www.usc.edu/schools/annenberg/asc/projects/comm544/library/artists/MatisseHenri.html)

Other
Franz Kafka (1883-1924) – Jewish Czech-born writer, most famous for his story “The Metamorphosis,” about a man who awakens to find himself turned into a cockroach. He died of tuberculosis.

Marie Curie (1867-1934) – Polish physicist, who, with her husband, isolated the elements polonium and radium. They received a Nobel Prize in 1903.

Max Planck (1858-1947) – German physicist who developed the quantum theory, based on the assumption that energy was emitted in bursts, not as a steady flow. He was one of the first to recognize the significance of Einstein’s theory of relativity.

Guillaume Apollinaire (1880-1918) – French poet, writer and art critic; one of the circle of artists and intellectuals who lived in Montmartre at the turn of the 20th century; he died during the Spanish flu epidemic

Euclid (ca. 325 – 265 B.C.E.) – Egyptian mathematician, who wrote in Greek, often considered to be the father of geometry; he also wrote the earliest surviving treatise on perspective

“Ta rah rah boom dee ay” – this is an actual song, “Tha ma ra boum de hé,” composed in 1891, by Henri J. Sayers, performed in French cafés at the time. It took on another life during the next century…

Critique of Pure Reason, by Immanuel Kant – first published in 1781, it is one of the most influential works in the history of Western philosophy, an attempt to bridge the gap between rationalism (pure thought) and empiricism (conclusions drawn from observation). Einstein was introduced to this text at the age of 10.

unified field theory – is an attempt to unify all the fundamental forces and the interactions between elementary particles into a single theoretical framework. The term was coined by Einstein who attempted to reconcile his general theory of relativity with electromagnetism in a single field theory. He worked on this during his tenure at Princeton’s Institute for Advanced Study in the 1930s and 40s. His quest proved elusive and a unified field theory, sometimes grandiosely referred to as the Theory of Everything (TOE, for short), has remained the holy grail for physicists, the long-sought theory which would explain the nature and behavior of all matter.

absinthe – a highly alcoholic green anise-flavored drink derived from a medicinal plant; it originated in Switzerland as a medicine, but is best known for its popularity in late 19th and early 20th century France among artistic communities, portrayed as a highly addictive and dangerous drug.

Bar Rouge – most likely the Moulin (or, Moulon) Rouge (red windmill), the most famous of the Montmartre cafés at the end of the 19th century; the night life there immortalized by the posters and paintings of Toulouse Lautrec

manifesto – any written declaration of intention or principles, usually of a political nature, but also popular among some artist groups in the early 20th century.

idiot savant – an intellectually disabled person who exhibits extraordinary ability in a highly specialized area, such as music or mathematics.

Symbolism – movement of late 19th century writers and artists, chiefly French, who rejected Realism and used symbolic or dream-like images to evoke ideas and emotions.

Romanticism – An artistic and intellectual movement originating in Europe in the late 18th century and characterized by a heightened interest in nature, emphasis on the individual's expression of emotion and imagination, departure from the attitudes and forms of classicism, and rebellion against established social rules and conventions.
The “Post” and “Neo” romanticism of the 20th century (and currently) are essentially synonymous – referring to many aspects of a long-lived tradition in art and music, interested in beauty, intuition and feeling. There are other applications of “neo” and “post” to art movements which can be differentiated from each other. “Post” tends to mean the development of a movement naturally into a new phase, such as “Post-Impressionism,” whereas “neo” usually refers to a revival of a phenomenon long gone, such as the “Neo-Gothic” of the mid 19th century.

triptych – a work of art divided into three sections; usually the term is applied to sacred panel or altar painting, common in the Renaissance.

Tiffany’s – famous jewelry store in New York City.

Hiawatha – American Indian leader of the Mohawk and Onondaga tribes, who lived around 1550, and who is credited with founding the Iroquois Confederacy. The famous poem by Longfellow is actually based on an Algonquian trickster figure and not the historical peace-maker.