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Politically Incorrect:
Women Artists and Female
Imagery in Early Modern Europe
By Gina Strumwasser
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• Table of Contents
• Excerpt of Chapter 1
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Gina Strumwasser
California State University, Fresno
Bassim Hamadeh, Publisher
Christopher Foster, Vice President
Michael Simpson, Vice President of Acquisitions
Jessica Knott, Managing Editor
Stephen Milano, Creative Director
Kevin Fahey, Cognella Marketing Program Manager
Melissa Accornero, Acquisitions Editor
Copyright © 2012 by University Readers, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reprinted,
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First published in the United States of America in 2012 by University Readers, Inc.
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Printed in the United States of America
ISBN: 978-1-60927-488-7
Contents
Dedicationvii
List of Illustrations
Part ONE: Women Artists of Early Modern Europe
1
Introduction3
Women’s role in Alberti’s The Family in
Renaissance Florence and in Castiglione’s The Courtier 4
“Why have there been no great women artists?”
5
Ancient and Medieval: Boccaccio’s account of the early
women artists Thamyris, Marcia and Irene, and the first
woman Eve, in Concerning Famous Women (De Mulieribus Claris) 12
Thamyris12
Marcia15
Irene15
The First Woman: Eve
16
Christine de Pizan (also Pisan, 1365–ca. 1430)
17
Women Artists in Sacred Spaces: The Convent
18
Early Modern Europe: The Renaissance
Did women have a Renaissance? 19
What Stimulated and Promoted Women to Produce Art
Professionally? In What Manner Were They Able to Excel
in the Male-Dominated Cultures of Early Modern Europe? 20
The Northern Renaissance 20
Caterina van Hemessen (1528–1587)
The Italian Renaissance 20
25
Properzia de’ Rossi (ca. 1490–1530)
26
Lavinia Fontana (1552–1614)
31
Sofonisba Anguissola (1532/1535–1625)
40
The Baroque 44
Judith Leyster (1609–1660)
44
Maria de Grebber (Dutch, 1602–1680)
48
Artemisia Gentileschi (Italian 1593–1652/1653)
49
18th- and early-19th-Century France: Rococo and Neoclassicism
Marguerite Gérard (French 1761–1837) 54
Elisabeth Louise Vigée-Lebrun (1755–1842)
57
Conclusion to Part I: Can we politically correct history?
60
Part TWO: Female Imagery Women from
Sacred and Classical Texts
63
Introduction65
Categories67
Gender Defined
68
Female Religious and Female Saints
69
The Heroine
69
The Virgin Mary 69
St. Mary Magdalen
82
Religious Women and Female Saints St. Teresa of Avila (1515–1582)
95
97
Images of Faith: Women from the Old Testament 99
The Female Hero Metamorphosed and the Woman Betrayed
99
Rebecca102
Judith104
Goddesses and Mortal Women from Ancient Literature
and History: The Virtuous Victims
114
Women from Ancient Literature
114
Danae115
Europa118
Io120
Daphne 122
Andromeda124
Eos/Aurora126
Women from Ancient History 133
The Sabine Women
133
Lucretia138
The Femme Fatale (Female Aggressors and Predators)
141
Eve142
Delilah151
Venus152
Conclusion to Part II: How can we employ female imagery?
160
In memory of my mother, Judith, and to my husband, Stewart,
for his infinite patience and continual support.
LiSt of iLLuStrationS
Part one: Women artiStS of earLy moDern euroPe
Fig #
Description
page #
Fig. 1-1.
The Limbourg Brothers, February Page, from the Très Riches Heures
du Duc de Berry, Chantilly, Musée Condé.
6
Fig. 1-2.
The Limbourg Brothers, June Page, from the Très Riches Heures
7
Fig. 1-3.
The Limbourg Brothers, September Page, from the Très Riches Heures
8
Fig. 1-4.
Pietro Lorenzetti, Birth of the Virgin, Siena,
Museo dell’Opera del Duomo.
9
Fig. 1-5.
Domenico Ghirlandaio, Birth of St. John the Baptist,
Florence, Cappella Maggiore, Santa Maria Novella.
10
Fig. 1-5a.
Detail. Domenico Ghirlandaio, Birth of St. John the Baptist,
Florence, Cappella Maggiore, Santa Maria Novella.
10
Fig. 1-6.
Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Allegory of the Good Government in the City,
Siena, Sala della Pace (also titled Sala dei Nove), Palazzo Pubblico.
11
Fig. 1-7.
Anon. French, Page with Thamyris, from Giovanni Boccaccio,
Concerning Famous Women (De Claris Mulieribus),
Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale.
13
Fig. 1-7a.
Detail. Anon. French, Page with Thamyris, from Giovanni Boccaccio,
Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale.
13
Fig. 1-8.
Anon. French, Page with Marcia, detail from Giovanni Boccaccio,
Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale.
14
ix
x
PoLiticaLLy incorrect
Fig #
Description
page #
Fig. 1-9.
Anon. French, Christine de Pisan in Her Study and the Building
of the City of Ladies, Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale.
17
Fig. 1-10.
Caterina van Hemessen, Self-Portrait at the Easel, Basel, Öffentliche
Kunstsammlung.
22
Fig 1-11.
Caterina van Hemessen, Young Woman Playing the Virginals, Cologne, WallrafRichartz Museum.
24
Fig. 1-12.
Portrait of Properzia de Rossi, Illustration from “Le Vite” by Giorgio Vasari,
edition of 1568.
26
Fig. 1-12a.
Properzia de Rossi, Crest of the Grassi Family, Bologna, Museo Civico Medievale.
27
Fig. 1-13.
Properzia de Rossi, Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar, Bologna, Museo di San
Petronio.
28
Fig. 1-13a.
Detail. Properzia de Rossi, Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar, Bologna, Museo di
San Petronio.
29
Fig. 1-14.
Lavinia Fontana, Self-Portrait in a Studiolo (or Study), Florence, Galleria degli
Uffizi, Corridoro Vasariano.
33
Fig. 1-15.
Lavinia Fontana, Portrait of a Noblewomen, Washington D.C., National Museum
of Women in the Arts.
35
Fig. 1-16.
Jan van Eyck, Arnolfini Wedding Portrait, London, National Gallery.
37
Fig. 1-17.
Lavinia Fontana, Self-Portrait at the Spinet Accompanied by a Handmaiden, Rome,
Accademia Nazionale di San Luca.
40
Fig. 1-18.
Sofonisba Anguissola, Self-Portrait with a Book, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches
Museum.
41
Fig. 1-19.
Sofonisba Anguissola, Self-Portrait at the Easel, Lancut, Muzeum Zamek.
43
Fig. 1-20.
Judith Leyster, Self-Portrait, Washington D.C., National Gallery of Art.
46
Fig. 1-21.
Maria de Grebber, Portrait of the Priest Augustinus de Wolff, Utrecht,
Rijksmuseum Het Catharijneconvent. (Museum website: www.catharijneconvent.nl/)
48
Fig. 1-22.
Artemisia Gentileschi, Self-Portrait as the Allegory of Painting, Windsor Castle,
The Royal Collection.
51
Fig. 1-23.
Felice Maria Casoni, Portrait medal of Lavinia Fontana, obverse, 1611, London,
British Museum.
53
Fig. 1-24.
Marguerite Gérard, The First Step, Cambridge, Fogg Art Museum, Harvard
University Art Museums.
56
Fig. 1-25.
Elisabeth Louise Vigée-Lebrun, Self Portrait in a Straw Hat, London, National
Gallery.
58
xi
Part tWo: femaLe imaGery Women
from SacreD anD cLaSSicaL textS
Fig #
Description
page #
Fig. 2-1.
Jean Pucelle, Betrayal and Annunciation from the Book of Hours of Jeanne d’Evreux,
New York, Metropolitan Museum, Cloisters Collection.
71
Fig. 2-1a.
Detail. Jean Pucelle, Annunciation from the Book of Hours of Jeanne d’Evreux, New
York, Metropolitan Museum, Cloisters Collection.
72
Fig. 2-2.
Giovanni Lanfranco, Annunciation, St. Petersburg, Hermitage Museum.
73
Fig. 2-3
Lavinia Fontana, Annunciation, Baltimore, Walters Museum of Art. (Museum
Website: thewalters.org/)
78
Fig. 2-4.
Robert Campin (Master of Flemalle and Workshop), The Merode Altarpiece,
center panel of the Annunciation, New York, Metropolitan Museum, Cloisters
Collection.
75
Fig. 2-5.
Duccio, The Maesta Altarpiece, Siena, Museo dell’Opera del Duomo.
75
Fig. 2-6.
Elisabetta Sirani, Virgin and Child, London, Warburg.
76
Fig. 2-7.
Mary Casssatt, Mother About to Wash Her Sleepy Child, Los Angeles, Los Angeles
County Museum of Art.
78
Fig. 2-8.
Leonardo da Vinci, Madonna of the Rocks, Paris, Musée du Louvre.
79
Fig. 2-9.
Raphael, La Belle Jardinière, Paris, Musée du Louvre.
80
Fig. 2-10.
Caravaggio, Madonna of the Pilgrims, Rome, Church of Saint Agostino.
81
Fig. 2-11.
Hugo van der Goes, Portinari Altarpiece, Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi.
83
Fig. 2-12.
Giotto, Lamentation, Padua, Arena Chapel (also titled Scrovegni Chapel).
85
Fig. 2-13.
Caravaggio, Entombment of Christ, Rome, Pinacoteca Vaticana.
86
Fig. 2-14.
Donatello, St. Mary Magdalen, Florence, Duomo Museum.
87
Fig. 2-15.
Anon. Spanish, 1100–1300, Noli me tangere, Madrid, Museo Aqueologico
Nacional.
89
Fig. 2-16.
Lavinia Fontana, Noli me tangere, Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi.
90
Fig. 2-17.
Giovanni Savoldo, St. Mary Magdalen at the Sepulchre, Los Angeles, Getty Center
and Museum.
91
Fig. 2-18.
Antonello da Messina, Virgin Annunciate, Palermo, Galleria Nazionale della
Sicilia.
92
Fig. 2-19.
Leonardo da Vinci, Angel of the Annunciation (after Leonardo), Basel, Offenliche
Kunstsammlung. (Museum website: www.wga.hu/database/museums/
kunstmus.html )
92
Fig. 2-20.
Titian, St. Mary Magdalen, Florence, Palazzo Pitti.
94
Fig. 2-21.
Gianlorenzo Bernini, St. Mary Magdalen, Siena, Cathedral, Chigi Chapel.
96
xii
Fig #
Description
page #
Fig. 2-22.
Gian Lorenzo Bernini, St. Teresa of Avila in Ecstasy, Rome, Church of Santa
Maria della Victoria.
99
Fig. 2-22a.
Detail. Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Bozetto, St. Teresa of Avila in Ecstasy, St.
Petersburg, Hermitage Museum.
100
Fig. 2-22b.
Detail. Gian Lorenzo Bernini, St. Teresa of Avila in Ecstasy, Rome, Church of
Santa Maria della Victoria.
100
Fig. 2-22c.
101
Fig. 2-22d.
101
Fig. 2-23.
Unknown Artist 15th c., Speculum humanae salvationis, detail Judith Slaying
Holofernes, Paris, Bibliotheque nationale de France.
101
Fig. 2-24.
German 15th c., Biblia Pauperum, Annunciation with the Fall of Eve and Gideon’s
Fleece, Washington DC, National Gallery of Art.
101
Fig. 2-25.
Lorenzi Ghiberti, Florence, Gates of Paradise (East Doors of the Baptistery).
103
Fig. 2-25a.
Detail. Lorenzi Ghiberti, The Story of Jacob and Esau, Florence, Gates of Paradise
(East Doors of the Baptistery).
104
Fig. 2-26.
Donatello, Judith, Florence, Palazzo Vecchio (Palazzo della Signoria).
106
Fig. 2-27.
Lavinia Fontana, Judith, London, Walpole Art Gallery.
107
Fig. 2-28.
Jan Massys, Judith with the Head of Holofernes, Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum
voor Schone Kunsten.
109
Fig. 2-29.
Caravaggio, Judith, Rome, Palazzo Barberini.
110
Fig. 2-30.
Artemisia Gentileschi, Judith, Florence, Museo degli Uffizi.
111
Fig. 2-31.
Artemisia Gentileschi, Judith and Maidservant with the Head of Holofernes,
Detroit, Institute of Arts.
112
Fig. 2-32.
Elisabetta Sirani, Judith with the Head of Holofernes, Cambridge, England,
Burghley House Gallery.
113
Fig 2-32a.
Detail. Elisabetta Sirani, Judith with the Head of Holofernes, Cambridge, England,
Burghley House Gallery.
114
Fig. 2-33.
Jan Gossaert, Danae, Munich, Alte Pinakothek.
116
Fig. 2-34.
Titian, Danae, Madrid, Museo del Prado.
117
Fig. 2-35.
Rembrandt, The Rape of Europa, Los Angeles, Getty Center and Museum.
118
Fig. 2-36.
Correggio, Jupiter and Io, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum.
121
Fig. 2-37.
Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Apollo and Daphne, Rome, Villa Borghese.
122
Fig. 2-38.
Giorgio Vasari, Perseus and Andromeda, Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi.
125
Fig. 2-39.
Annibale Carracci, Perseus and Andromeda, Rome, Palazzo Farnese.
126
Fig. 2-40.
Guido Reni, Aurora, Rome, Casino Rospigliosi.
126
Fig #
Description
Fig. 2-41.
Guercino, Aurora, Rome, Villa Ludovisi.
128
Fig. 2-42.
Agostino Carracci, Aurora and Cephalus, Rome, Palazzo Farnese.
129
Fig. 2-43.
Nicolas Poussin, Aurora and Cephalus, London, National Gallery.
130
Fig. 2-44.
Douris (Painter), Eos and Memnon, Paris, Musée du Louvre.
131
Fig. 2-45.
Michelangelo, Pietà, Rome, Cathedral of St. Peter’s, The Vatican.
132
Fig. 2-46.
Nicolas Poussin, Rape of the Sabine Women, New York, Metropolitan Museum of
Art.
133
Fig. 2-47.
Giovanni Bologna, Rape of the Sabine Woman, Florence, Loggia dei Lanzi.
134
Fig. 2-48.
Bernini, Pluto and Persephone, Rome, Villa Borghese.
135
Fig. 2-48a.
Detail. Bernini, Pluto and Persephone, Rome, Villa Borghese.
136
Fig. 2-49.
Master LD, Tarquin and Lucretia, Paris, Bibliotheque de l’Ecole des Beaux-Arts.
138
Fig. 2-50.
Artemisia Gentileschi, Lucretia, Genoa, Milan, Collection of Gerolamo Etro.
139
Fig. 2-51.
Rembrandt, Lucretia, Minneapolis, Institute of Arts.
141
Fig. 2-52.
Limbourg Brothers, Scenes from Genesis, Tres Riches Heures du Duc de Berry,
Chantilly, Musee Conde.
143
Fig. 2-53.
Hubert and Jan van Eyck, The Ghent Altarpiece (Open), Ghent, Cathedral of St.
Bavo.
144
Fig. 2-54.
Albrecht Dürer, Adam and Eve, Boston, Museum of Fine Arts.
145
Fig. 2-55.
Aphrodite Braschi (free copy of Cnidian Aphrodite, 1st century BC), Munich,
Glyptothek
146
Fig. 2-55a.
Detail. Head of Cnidus Aphrodite (Roman copy, 2nd century AD ?), Paris, Musee
du Louvre..
147
Fig. 2-56.
Michelangelo, The Fall of Man and the Expulsion from the Garden of Eden, Rome,
The Sistine Chapel, The Vatican.
148
Fig. 2-56a.
Detail. Michelangelo, The Fall of Man and the Expulsion from the Garden of Eden,
Rome, The Sistine Chapel, The Vatican.
148
Fig. 2-56b.
148
Fig. 2-56c.
149
Fig. 2-56d.
Hans Baldung Grien, The Witches Sabbath, Vienna, Graphische Sammlung
Albertina.
150
Fig. 2-57.
Rembrandt, The Blinding of Samson, Frankfurt, Stadelsches Kunstinstitut und
Stadtische Galerie.
151
Fig. 2-58.
Sandro Botticelli, The Birth of Venus, Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi.
153
Fig. 2-59.
Titian, The Venus of Urbino, Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi.
155
xiii
page #
xiv
Fig #
Description
page #
Fig. 2-60.
Lucas Cranach the Elder, The Judgment of Paris, New York, Metropolitan
Museum of Art.
156
Fig. 2-61.
Agnolo Bronzino, The Allegory of Venus, London, National Gallery.
157
Fig. 2-62.
Peter Paul Rubens, Garden of Love, Madrid, Museo del Prado.
157
Fig. 2-63.
Boucher, The Toilet of Venus, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
158
Fig. 2-64.
Bellini, Toilette of Venus, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum.
158
Fig. 2-65.
Hieronymus (or Jerome) Bosch, Tabletop of the Seven Deadly Sins, Madrid,
Museo del Prado.
160
Fig. 2-65a.
Detail. Hieronymus (or Jerome) Bosch, Tabletop of the Seven Deadly Sins, detail.
Madrid, Museo del Prado.
161
Part
ONE
Women artiStS of
earLy moDern euroPe
introDuction
Fior di Virtu: On the other hand, if we look closely at the evils done by women, we see
that they are small in comparison with those done by men. And in the carnal vice we find
much more reticence and suffering among women than among men. In fact every day we see
examples of women strongly resisting and defending themselves against the deceits and the
violence of men, while the latter do not have to defend themselves against women. So that
those who speak so badly of these poor and unfortunate women would do better to be silent
since, naturally they do not have any true and honorable foundation.1
I
s the profession of art a privilege given only to the male gender? Is creativity exceptionally related
to the concept of male genius? In order to study women artists, it is necessary to comprehend
their unique history. Opportunities open to women today were not available, acknowledged, or
encouraged prior to the middle of the 20th century. Women’s life experience informed a different
perception, creativity, and identity as it does in modern society. According to art historian Diane
Apostolos-Cappadona:
For better or worse, the western mythology of the artist has been modeled upon and idealized in the male of the species. As lesser beings, women were not permitted the luxury of
artistic training or the freedom to be creative … Those women who struggled to live a life of
creative productivity were, most often, denied the privilege of marriage and family!2
1 Florentine Fior di Virtu of 1491, trans. N. Fersin, Library of Congress, 1953, 18.
2 D. Apostolos-Cappadona and L. Ebersole, Women, Creativity, and the Arts, New York, 1995, 2.
Women artiStS of earLy moDern euroPe
3
4
For many female artists, the cost of this struggle was their personal freedom. Since the foundation
of the history of visual culture is dependent upon chronology, a historical account of the emergence
of women artists and the interpretation of their often remarkable development and careers require
further discussion.
Women’s role in alberti’s The Family in
Renaissance FloRence anD in castiglione’s The couRTieR
In order to explore the role of female artists, it is necessary to consider more pervasively the behavioral
constructs for women living in Early Modern Europe. Writers of the 15th and 16th centuries described
the virtues of the female gender. For example, in his text The Family in Renaissance Florence (Della
Famiglia, ca. 1433–1434), Leone Battista Alberti, a 15th-century architect and theorist, defined the
significance of physical beauty and the intrinsic capacity to create and care for children in the selection
of a spouse.
They say that in choosing a wife one looks for beauty, parentage, and riches … I think that
beauty in a woman likewise, must be judged not only by the charm and refinement of her
face, but still more by the grace of her person and her aptitude for bearing and giving birth
to many fine children.3
Since the primary goal for women was producing a family successor, Alberti considered motherhood as much more important than aptitude.4 According to the writer, artificial goals and false achievement seem far more admirable for women than intellect.
Baldassare Castiglione constructed a model of conduct for women of noble rank in his Book of the
Courtier (Il libro del cortegiano), completed in 1518 (published a decade later). In dialogue format,
the Italian author records gendered attributes and evils that are discussed by an enlightened group
of courtiers. Lively conversation disguises instructions for courtly behavior. The good woman, or
“woman of the palace,” is distinguished from the courtesan, or cortegiana,5 a classification of refined
and cultivated mistress. Unique to the period, Castiglione’s “palace women,” or female nobility, are acknowledged for their intelligence and courtly grace rather than described in common roles of daughter,
wife, and mother.
What was the basis for The Courtier’s popularity?6 This text informed wellborn women throughout
the 16th century who read and possessed copies of Castiglione’s celebrated manuscript. The Courtier is
a book of manners that served as an exemplar for women and men of noble birth in Italy and elsewhere
from the early 16th century and for centuries after its initial publication. Castiglione’s characters provide
a paradigm for aristocratic behavior that is echoed in later versions, translations, and descendants of
The Courtier. Appropriate female courtly conduct included qualities of modesty, grace, beauty, soft and
3 L. B. Alberti, The Family in Renaissance Florence, trans. R. N. Watkins, Columbia, 1969, 115.
4 This certainly must be understood in the context of high infant mortality rates during the period.
5 P. Burke, The Fortunes of the Courtier, University Park, 1995, 28.
6 Burke lists 22 attributes necessary for the male courtier and 13 for the woman of the palace. Ibid., 51.
5
delicate tenderness, sweetness, and gentle birth, as well as the skills of household, property, and child
management.
In contrast to Alberti’s descriptive attributes, Castiglione suggests that noblewomen require academic wisdom in addition to practical understanding of painting and the visual arts. He elaborates on
other prerequisites essential for the female courtier. “I wish this Lady to have knowledge of letters, of
music, of painting, and know how to dance and how to be festive, adding a discreet modesty and the
giving of a good impression of herself to those other things that have been required of the Courtier.”7
Were these virtues intended to supplement “merely in the management of her house, children, and
family?”8 With the exception of female nobility who entered convents, practical painterly exposure or
skill was considered only subordinate to the role of wife and mother, never understood as a potential
profession or womanly occupation.
“Why have there been no great Women artists?”9
What is the purpose of studying creative women? Is it necessary to consider the particular female experience in history? Because male perception provides the foundation for the study of European history,
it is necessary to acknowledge who recorded these chronicles. White, Western European noblemen
transcribed and interpreted chronological facts that need to be politically corrected, revised, and
reinterpreted to comprehend the experience of the female “other.” Can female identity be deciphered,
defined, or reconstructed through patriarchal accounts and archives?
In male-dominated culture, female identity was dependent upon relationships with men in the roles
of daughters, wives, mothers—and even after death, widows. Women were traditionally relegated to
the private sphere of the home. Without means of dependable contraception, numerous children were
born but few survived infancy. The high rate of infant mortality made life a most difficult existence
and necessitated the gruesome task of successively burying children and returning again to a state of
perpetual pregnancy.
Prior to the fast-food drive-through, meals were made from scratch after harvesting the necessary
ingredients from fields and gardens and processing them for consumption. Images of female livelihood
appear in calendar sections of books of hours or prayer books where illuminations of the distinct activities of each month were included. For example, in the lavish book of hours known as Les Très Riches
Heures du Duc de Berry (or The Very Rich Hours of the Duke of Berry), the Limbourg brothers fashioned
women working as household servants or in the countryside together with men.
Painted on the February Page (Fig. 1-1), two servants, a man and woman, are represented in front
of the fire on a frosty day with snow embellishing the landscape beyond the home. Although both
are somewhat remiss in their less-than-decorous poses, another woman, perhaps the proprietor of the
house, presents herself in a more graceful attitude. The scene in June (Fig. 1-2) displays two women in
7 Ibid., 211.
8 Ibid., 209.
9 This is the title of Linda Nochlin’s famous essay. The essay is published in L. Nochlin, Women, Art, and Power and Other
Essays, New York, 1988, 145–178. The essay is also included in D. Apostolos-Cappadona and L. Ebersole, Women, Creativity,
and the Arts, New York, 1995, 42–69.
6
Fig. 1-1. The Limbourg Brothers, February Page, from the Très Riches Heures du Duc
de Berry, Chantilly, Musée Condé.
Fig. 1-2. The Limbourg Brothers, June Page, from the Très Riches Heures du Duc de
Berry, Chantilly, Musée Condé.
7
8 Politically Incorrect
Fig. 1-3. The Limbourg Brothers, September Page, from the Très Riches Heures du Duc
de Berry, Chantilly, Musée Condé.
9
the foreground gathering and stacking hay into corpulent bales. Modestly dressed in shabby clothing
and devoid of shoes, they appear nearby the men, working in the field while giving their uncomplicated
tasks a certain dignity. Again in the month of September, women join men in picking the grapes.10
Enacting a common activity for September (Fig. 1-3), grape harvest embraces the effort of many
people, and this was not different during the early 15th century. In the illuminated page, a woman holds
up her arms near her head, perhaps shielding herself from the sun. Behind her, another woman picks
grapes, bending over the field to gather the fruit that will be placed inside of her basket.
These small pictures provide visual information regarding women’s occupations in the early decades
of 15th-century France. Responsibility for the physical institution of the house, preparation of food, and
the bearing and rearing of children (for both the noble and lower classes) were primary female obligations
(men were responsible for the “instruction” of their sons after they reached the age of about six). Women
also worked as wet nurses, midwives, domestic servants, commonly helped their husbands with farming
and small local shops that provided services for the wealthy, or lived a restricted existence within convents,
isolated from men. With these
exceptions, they infrequently
departed the domestic sphere of
society.
By the Middle Ages, paintings depicting the birth of the
Virgin or the birth of St. John
the Baptist customarily provide
a glimpse into the role of midwife and wet nurse reflected
in these religious themes. For
example, in Pietro Lorenzetti’s
Birth of the Virgin (Fig. 1-4,
1335–1342), St. Anne, mother
of the Virgin Mary, lies on a
bed adorned with a brilliant
red plaid blanket. Below, two
midwives bathe the newborn
Virgin, and other women are
admitted to the room joining
in the celebration of gift giving.
Joachim, the Virgin’s father,
Fig. 1-4. Pietro Lorenzetti, Birth of the Virgin, Siena, Museo dell’Opera
remains with a friend while
waiting for the news of the birth del Duomo.
10 The calendar page of September was begun by the Limbourg Brothers and finished by the painter, Jean Colombe, seven
decades later. See Jean Longnon (et al.), The Très Riches Heures of Jean, Duke of Berry, Musée Condé, Chantilly, New York,
1969), plate #10 and description.
10
Fig. 1-5. Domenico Ghirlandaio, Birth of St. John the Baptist, Florence, Cappella
Maggiore, Santa Maria Novella.
of his daughter. For the culture of Early Modern
Europe, midwifery was an essential career for
women. The medical profession was called only
for the noble women in labor whose lives or their
infants were in grave peril.
In the Birth of St. John the Baptist (Fig. 1-5,
Florence, Santa Maria Novella, 1485–1490),
Domenico del Ghirlandaio portrays a wet nurse
who suckles the newborn St. John while his mother,
St. Elizabeth, reclines in her bed in an attractively
appointed camera, or bedroom. Lying under the
linens and blanket, she looks toward her infant
child. Close to the back wall, a maidservant attends
to St. Elizabeth by bringing her a tray wrapped in
cloth that contains beverages in glass carafes as well
as a difficult-to-decipher platter of food (Fig 1-5a).
The professions of domestic service, housemaid,
midwife, and wet nurse reinforced a life of luxury
for the noble classes, providing the wealthy with
essential tools for the well-being and comfort of the
household and its occupants.
Infrequent views of mundane life survive in
calendar sections of illuminated manuscripts as well
Fig. 1-5a. Detail. Domenico Ghirlandaio, Birth of
St. John the Baptist, Florence, Cappella Maggiore,
Santa Maria Novella.
11
Fig. 1-6. Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Allegory of the Good Government in the City, Siena, Sala della Pace (also
titled Sala dei Nove), Palazzo Pubblico.
as in rare scenes of cityscapes, such as Ambrogio Lorenzetti’s Allegory of the Good Government in the
City (Fig. 1-6). As indicated in pictorial accounts of the Middle Ages and Early Renaissance, the public
sphere—generally denied to women—was commonly reserved for men.
Did women recognize an opportunity for vocational choice? At least until they had families of their
own, often sacrificing artistic ambition or consciously choosing to pursue art like Sofonisba Anguissola,
Lavinia Fontana, and Artemisia Gentileschi, few female artists followed their pictorial calling. In addition, the obligation of humility or modest conduct befitting a member of the female gender had to
be balanced by the desire for recognition. Prior to 1550, little record of artistic achievements of female
others survive.
Female talent was framed by familial and financial support. Before the middle of the 19th century,
most renowned women artists were related to men. Nearly all had gifted fathers, and some married painters who advocated the professional practice of their wives’ exceptional ability. Daughter
of a painter (Prospero Fontana), Lavinia Fontana married a lesser-known artist, Giovanni Paolo
Zappi of Imola, who sustained and validated her career. As demonstrated by Sutherland Harris and
12
Nochlin, Lavinia became the chief money earner for the family.11 Women whose fathers recognized
their creative talent and encouraged them produced art. Not all talented women, however, were
inspired to practice their profession. An exception to this rule is Elisabetta Sirani, whose father,
the painter Giovanni Andrea Sirani, did not enable her accomplishments, but because of the art
critic Carlo Cesare Malvasia’s affirmative assessment, Sirani’s father later reevaluated his daughter’s
pictorial ability.12
ancient anD meDieval: boccaccio’s account oF the early Women
artists thamyris, marcia anD irene, anD the First
Woman eve, in conceRning Famous Women
(De mulieRibus claRis)
For the past 25 years, and specifically since the 1977 publication of Ann Sutherland Harris and Linda
Nochlin’s Women Artists: 1550–1950, female creators or makers have been recovered from history and
accredited in art historical accounts. Indeed, the ancient Roman Pliny the Elder, whose work informed
later writers, recognized women of talent. Depending upon Pliny for ancient sources, the 14th-century
Italian Giovanni Boccaccio, acknowledged female artists in his volume, Concerning Famous Women
(originally published De Mulieribus Claris).
thamyris
Boccaccio describes, for example, the Greek painter Thamyris (or Timarete, probably the daughter
of a known artist, Micon the Minor)13 and the ancient Roman Marcia (daughter of Varro) from antique chronicles. These women were celebrated when they lived. According to Boccaccio, “Thamyris
scorned the duties of women and practiced her father’s art.”14 She was held in high regard by the king
of Macedonia, Archelaus, and her painting of Diana was renowned by the Ephesians.15 Although
Boccaccio reinforces the individuality of female talent and acknowledges an appreciation for the female artists’ skill, he also communicates surprise at women’s ability. This confusion and contradiction
may convey the prevailing male attitude toward the female gender. “And she should be praised even
more if we consider the spindles and baskets of other women.”16
An illustration of Thamyris (Fig. 1-7) in the process of painting is revealing. From the hand of
an anonymous French painter ca. 1402 (also known as French miniaturist of the early 15th century),
Thamyris appears in her studio, working at her easel with a palette in her left hand while dressed in
sumptuous clothing lined with fur. The elegant fashion may be understood in association with the
11 A. S. Harris and L. Nochlin, Women Artists: 1550–1950, Exhibition Catalogue, Los Angeles County Museum of Art et al.,
December 21, 1976–March 13, 1977, 29.
12 Ibid.
13 G. Boccaccio, Concerning Famous Women, trans. Guido A. Guarino, New Brunswick, 1963, 122.
14 Ibid.
15 Ibid.
16 Ibid.
13
lofty profession of art (as would be codified by Cesare Ripa in the early 17th century). As she attentively
crafts an image of the Virgin and Child, her assistant, a young studio hand, crushes pigment. At another
table in the foreground, the nameless illuminator represents five small vessels or clay pots in various
shapes that contain a range of colors. Also portrayed on this worktable is an assortment of brushes,
which we can assume will be utilized by Thamyris. The scene of a woman painting in her studio with
all the accoutrements of her trade and an assistant certainly
had a consequence in the lives of later women artists, including Sofonisba Anguissola, who represented a self-portrait in
the guise of Thamyris, painting the Virgin and Child at her
easel. Similar in attitude to the Allegory of Painting, Thamyris
personifies the profession of art and illuminates as well the
potential of female talent.
Fig. 1-7. Anon. French, Page with
Thamyris, from Giovanni Boccaccio,
Concerning Famous Women (De Claris
Mulieribus), Paris, Bibliothèque
Nationale.
Fig. 1-7a. Detail. Anon. French, Page with Thamyris, from Giovanni
Boccaccio, Concerning Famous Women (De Claris Mulieribus), Paris,
Bibliothèque Nationale.
14 Politically Incorrect
Fig. 1-8. Anon. French, Page with Marcia, detail from Giovanni Boccaccio, Concerning Famous Women (De
Claris Mulieribus), Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale.
15
marcia
After extolling Marcia’s virginity (dependent not upon Pliny’s account but Boccaccio’s own
assumption)17 that was “kept untarnished of her own free will and not because of a superior’s coercion,”
Boccaccio lauds “the power of her intellect and the skill of her hands.” A painter and a sculptor, Marcia
was known to have had a great talent. Boccaccio is clear to remind the reader that similar to Thamyris,
while ”gifted by nature, she scorned [sic] womanly occupations and gave herself up completely to
the study of painting and sculpture so she would not languish in idleness.”18 In an illustration from
Boccaccio’s text, Marcia Paints a Self-Portrait, the ancient painter herself acknowledges her own
talent. Using a mirror to reflect her appearance, Marcia captures “the colors and features and the
expression of the face so completely that none of her contemporaries doubted that it was just like
her.”19
In the illumination (Fig. 1-8), Marcia paints her own image on a panel while holding a mirror in
her left hand to assess her face. For this reason she is portrayed three times, convincing the viewer (or
reader, in the case of the manuscript) of her rare talent. Similar to the Page with Thamyris, a workbench
is placed to Marcia’s left that contains additional pigment and brushes, the attributes of her profession. While the painter of these miniatures from Boccaccio’s Concerning Famous Women is unknown,
the illuminated page of Marcia Paints a Self-Portrait provides a basis for subsequent self-portrayals by
chronicled female artists living in Renaissance Flanders and Italy. These artists include Caterina van
Hemessen and Sofonisba Anguissola (discussed later in the chapter).20
Similar to painters of Early Modern Europe, Marcia’s unlikely access to a male model forced her
to fashion primarily female portraits and limited religious themes, preserving modesty and integrity,
a behavioral necessity for all women. The requirement of modesty promoted a hierarchy of pictorial
themes developed principally for female artists. Because woman were denied the opportunity to study
from live male nudes, female painters were consigned to crafting themes that were considered lowly
imitations of nature, such as still-lifes, genre scenes (of the domestic sphere), and portraits. Because
these women were regarded as unusual and curious, self-portraits were often commissioned by male
collectors to exhibit in their studies.
irene
Boccaccio also characterizes another artist, Irene, whose father, Cratinus (or Cratinax, was also a
painter and her teacher. Unsure of her cultural foundation or when she lived but believing that she
was Greek, Boccaccio further evaluated the accomplished artist whose ability exceeded her father’s
success.21 As noted by the author, Irene painted an acclaimed portrait of an old Calypso, the warrior
Theodorus and the dancer Alcisthenes. Acclaiming her talent and fame at the time that she lived,
Boccaccio concludes in a somewhat negative manner. “I thought that these achievements were
17 Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry, vol. I, London, 1974, 14.
18 Boccaccio, 144.
19 Ibid., 145.
20 It is certainly possible that Caterina van Hemessen and Sofonisba Anguissola owned copies of Boccaccio’s important text.
21 Ibid., 131.
16
worthy of some praise, for art is very much alien to the mind of women, and these things cannot
be accomplished without a great deal of talent, which in women is usually very scarce.”22 Perhaps
the exposure of women artists masks Boccaccio’s antithetical response to the female gender. This is
especially true in his description of Eve.
the First Woman: eve
In order to emphasize the uncommon talent of these ancient women, Boccaccio defines the notion
of female talent and contrasts it with male creativity. Although he esteems Marcia and Irene’s talent
as unique, the author constructs an unfavorable endorsement of the two women. Since he begins his
commentary with Eve, as a negative introduction to Concerning Famous Women, and the female gender,
Boccaccio’s true objectives must be questioned.
She was enjoying the garden’s pleasures together with her husband, when the Enemy, envious of her happiness, with execrable counsel instilled in her the thought that she could reach
greater glory if she disobeyed the one law which God had imposed upon her. With a woman’s
fickleness she believed him more than was good for her or for us. Before doing anything else,
she brought her pliant husband to her way of thinking with enticing suggestions, foolishly
thinking that she was about to rise to greater heights. With heedless daring, they broke the
law and tasted the apple of the tree of knowledge.23
As a man writing about women, Boccaccio may have perceived the female gender through the conventional negative stereotype of Eve that was transferred to “all” women, even the artistically talented.
Documented by Boccaccio, Thamyris, Irene, and Marcia “scorned” female occupations in order to
practice their art. Because they disdained customary wifely duties, he considered them closer to men
and thusly elevated in his eyes.
Boccaccio describes heroines and historic women alike. Mothers, wives, daughters and prostitutes,
commoners and royalty, a female pope (Pope John or Joan, who gave birth to a child, revealing her
female gender)24 and women with particular artistic talents (literary and pictorial) are also chronicled.
Although he juxtaposes prostitute and pope and reinforces negative female stereotypes, he identifies
and records significant achievements of members of the female gender (depending upon fact and fiction). Boccaccio’s volume, Concerning Famous Women, additionally provided a basis for one of the most
honored texts authored by a medieval woman, Christine de Pizan.
22 Ibid.
23 Ibid., 2.
24 Ibid., 231–233.
17
Fig. 1-9. Anon. French, Christine de Pisan in Her Study and the Building of the City of Ladies, Paris, Bibliothèque
Nationale.
christine De pizan (also pisan, 1365–ca. 1430)
Informed by Boccaccio, the French medieval author Christine de Pizan (Fig. 1-9) read a French translation of Concerning Famous Women in the collection of Jean, the Duke of Berry and Philip the Bold.25
Boccaccio’s famous volume inspired her own contribution in which she lauded female virtues. A type
of modernist defender of women, de Pizan criticized society for its lack of benefits to the female gender.
[Christine de Pizan] returns again and again, for instance, to the lack of access women have
to education. She praises her own father generously for giving her an education against the
conventional objections of her mother, and interjects defiantly that women’s minds are
“freer and sharper” than men’s … Her anger at the double standard, by which men, raping
women, then blame women for allowing them to do so, still rings loud and clear today. She
also paints a devastating and unchanged picture of violence in marriage, of drunken beatings
and spendthrift husbands.26
25 Meiss, vol. I, 13.
26 Christine de Pizan, The Book of the City of Ladies, trans. and foreword, E. J. Richards and M. Warner, New York, 1982, xiv.
18
In her text, The Book of the City of Ladies (Le livre de la cité des dames), de Pizan suggests that Reason,
Rectitude, and Justice, personified as women, build a city to support their goals.
And after we have populated [the City] with noble citizens, my sister, Lady Justice, will
come and lead the queen, outstanding over all, and accompanied by princesses of the highest dignity who will reside in the uppermost apartments and in the lofty towers … Will
they be dissolute or dishonored women? Certainly not, rather they shall all be women of
integrity, of great beauty, and authority, for there could no fairer populace nor any greater
adornment in the City than women of good character.27
Proposed by Millard Meiss in his volume French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry, a female illuminator (enluminatrice) may have fashioned the illustration for her manuscript.28 Because Christine
de Pizan esteems women by demonstrating support and compassion for them, it seems plausible that
she would have selected a female artist to paint representations for The Book of the City of Ladies.
Artists from the Renaissance and Baroque eras are more abundant than those of medieval Europe.
Perhaps depending upon the success of female predecessors, they implemented and preserved additional flexibility to practice their art. In his text, Meiss concludes that despite the inspiration from
ancient times upon Late Medieval and Early Renaissance art and artists, “not enough has been said
about the liberation of the minds—and the hands—of women.”29
Women artists in sacreD spaces: the convent
While few artistic signatures or celebrities survive from the Middle Ages, it is implicit that women
were involved in the art of illumination. Possibly active in sacred female communities, women, like
male clerics, may have dedicated their lives to the writing and decorating of manuscripts. At least four
women are documented as miniaturists, and in Bruges at the end of the 15th century, numerous female
painters were members of the painters’ guild.30 While entering a cloistered environment may not have
been a choice for some unmarried women, living an isolated existence in a religious community gave
female illuminators greater freedom to exercise their urge to create than their secular sisters.
Well-documented Florentine marriage practices of the 14th and 15th centuries clarify the reason that
a young, unmarried woman might have selected marriage to God rather than to mortal man. “Was a
surplus of girls for whom the lack of a dowry, an unfortunate physical appearance, or a lopsided marriage market made a normal conjugal career impossible absorbed into domestic service?”31 Entering
a convent often required significant dowries at times commensurate to marriage, and for this purpose
27 Ibid., 117.
28 Meiss, vol. I., 14. See Christine de Pizan, The Book of the City of Ladies, trans. and foreword, E. J. Richards and M. Warner,
New York, 1982.
29 Meiss, vol. I, 15.
30 Harris and Nochlin, 26.
31 C. Klapisch-Zuber, Women, Family, and Ritual in Renaissance Italy, trans. L. G. Cochrane, Chicago and London, 1987,
165–166.
19
poor women worked as household servants rather than participating in religious communities. Some
impoverished women lived in convents but were relegated to serving wealthier sisters. Abbesses were
selected from well-educated women of noble stature. Life in a convent was not necessarily a blissful
situation.32
The political structure of the convent sustained a hierarchy that was comparable to secular existence. Within its geographical, economical, and spiritual confines, the convent was framed with the
same class distinctions that prevailed in the public sphere. For female nobility whose families could
afford a sacred dowry, for widows who preferred the consecrated halls after the death of their husbands
(for example, Christine de Pizan decided later in life to live with her daughter in a convent), or for poor
women who did not have a choice, the alternative living situation of a convent secured an opportunity
to escape societal regulations. It additionally allowed them an artistic haven to engage in the production of art such as illuminated manuscripts. Since most noblewomen were trained in artistic practice,
they brought to the convent, even if widowed, a portion of their family’s wealth or dowry, education,
worthy patronage, and management skills that promoted and elevated their position to abbess.
Did hallowed isolation stimulate or stifle creativity? Although more consequential female artists
emerge after 1550 as independent painters outside of the religious community, working among women
(analogous to exclusively female universities) may have substantiated their self-confidence and artistic
talent. It is also possible that working in the scriptorium, they were required to transcribe someone
else’s ideas rather than follow their own creative impulse.
early moDern europe: the renaissance
DiD Women have a renaissance?33
Since this question surfaced more than three decades ago, it has become apparent from extant sources
that female artists emerged during the 16th century. Following the tradition of poets like Veronica
Franco34 (celebrated in the movie Dangerous Beauty), whose verses provide foundation for an evolving Venetian literary talent, female pictorial artists also become visible during the Renaissance. Now
documented, accomplishments of numerous women artists are considered analogous to their male
counterparts, although less in number. For reasons difficult to discern and despite their acknowledged,
life-time fame, these art makers were eliminated from the chronicles of art history. It is only in the past
three and a half decades that women artists have been given a voice, a consequence of the efforts of
feminist art historians Linda Nochlin and Ann Sutherland Harris. Their initial investigation and colossal endeavor resulted in Women Artists 1550–1950 (published in 1976), which awakened, afforded,
and advocated the identification of women artists as an essential link to the past.
Because female artists were depreciated after death, becoming invisible in history compared to
male artists whose careers were customarily redefined, redeemed, and sometimes exaggerated, their
creative production was not well safeguarded. The lack of historical recognition also contributed to the
32 G. Greer, The Obstacle Race, New York, 1979. See especially, Chapter VIII, “The Cloister.”
33 J. Kelly, “Did Women Have a Renaissance?,” in R. Bridenthal and C. Koonz, eds., Becoming Visible: Women in European
History, Boston, 1977, 141.
34 A. R. Jones and M. F. Rosenthal, eds. and trans., Veronica Franco: Poems and Selected Letters, Chicago and London, 1998.
20
physical demise of their artwork. In the past several hundred years, many have been forgotten. With
the exception of artists like Georgia O’Keeffe or Louise Nevelson, until 35 years ago, most university
students assumed that female artists in history did not exist. Not as highly regarded as male artists,
women were distinguished for their particular professional proficiency by the Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari, whose accounts have furnished primary source material for research and requisite
evidence of female artists in 16th-century Italy.
What stimulateD anD promoteD Women to proDuce art
proFessionally? in What manner Were they able to excel
in the male-DominateD cultures oF early moDern europe?
The resurgence of antiquity brought to the fore some pressing problems regarding the status of women.
The Aristotelian concept of woman as intellectually weaker than man was renewed with vigor in
Renaissance medical treatises and marriage manuals. In addition, revival of ancient texts, particularly
Ovid’s Metamorphoses, reinforced the lasciviousness of women and the rights of men to exploit these
privileges. As inheritors of Eve, women’s natural “evil” nature surfaced in the fashioning of popularized themes from the Bible, classical texts, and ancient history. Male artists commissioned by male
patrons evolved new themes for artistic crafting, including engraving, which engaged the eroticized
female image. Women artists, however, chose not to paint scenes of rape in the guise of love and, with
few exceptions, depended upon portraits or small devotional scenes by which they could earn their
income. Women received court positions, like Caterina van Hemessen and Sofonisba Anguissola, who
acquired her dowry for marriage after almost 20 years of service to the queen of Spain.
the northern renaissance caterina van hemessen (1528–1587)
Born in Antwerp to Barbara de Fevere35 and the painter Jan Sanders van Hemessen, Caterina van
Hemessen is one of the earliest documented female artists of Early Modern Europe. Trained in the
city of her birth by her father, Caterina36 produced a self-image that was to inform both Northern and
Italian painters. As a miniaturist and painter, she worked for the queen of Hungary37 at the Spanish
court of Philip II and was acknowledged for crafting self-images and portraits of women and men, as
well as small devotional panels.
In his discussion of Jan van Hemessen, art historian Walter Friedlander mentions a “Katharina” van
Hemessen as the daughter of Jan and a painter.38 Depending upon the early 17th-century biographer
35 M. J. Friedlander, Early Netherlandish Painting, vol. XII, New York and Washington, 1975, 44.
36 While it is argued that art historians identify female artists by their first name and male artists by their last, demeaning
women in history, in fact, this is not the case. Giotto, Masaccio, Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael, just to name a few,
are documented historically by their first names. Many male artists are noted by their nicknames, often associated with
embarrassing physical attributes.
37 Women, Creativity and the Arts, 72.
38 Friedlander, vol. XII, 44. In the same volume, Friedlander attributes numerous half-length paintings to a “Master of
Female Half-Lengths.” These half-length images appear similar in format to Caterina’s Self-Portrait of 1548. See especially
the paintings of St. Catherine and the Magdalen, plate #41, images 81, 82, 83. See also plates 42, 43, 44, and 45 that include
21
Karel van Mander,39 Friedlander refers to Caterina’s famous Self-Portrait of 1548, painted at the age of
20. Located today in Basel (Kunstmuseum, öffentliche Kunstsammlung), the Self-Portrait reveals van
Hemessen’s perception of artistic identity. An especially important insight for professional women, van
Hemessen may have initiated this construction of the self-image of the artist in the act of painting. An
earlier painter, the female illuminator “Claricia,” rendered a diminutive self-portrayal in a 12th-century
psalter, included in a decorative capital letter.40 To supplement Boccaccio’s text Concerning Famous
Women (described above in this chapter), an anonymous French miniaturist of the early 15th century
(ca. 1402–1403), fashioned Marcia Paints a Self-Portrait (Fig. 1-8).41 As explained earlier, in the illumination, the Roman Marcia crafts a self-portrayal holding a mirror and painting on a panel that rests
on her workbench. To her left, an elongated table decorates the complex tile floor and is lined with
small pots containing different pigments that Marcia uses to mix color. The mirror in Van Hemessen’s
self-portrayal, although not visible in the painting, is implied and the portrait emerges as the earliest
example of a living painter (and female) fashioned in the process of painting a self-image.
Self-portrayals by women acknowledge artistic identity and professional ambition. In addition to
the recognition of fame, these cultural attributes are usually reserved for the male gender. By designing a self-image, the artist communicates the ability to duplicate nature, a substantial talent and an
indispensable achievement of the visual arts of Early Modern Europe.
In the 1548 Self-Portrait (Fig. 1-10), van Hemessen portrays her own semblance in this guise,
depicting herself executing a self-portrayal. Painting a painting within a painting and dominating the
compositional space, the artist looks outside of the pictorial realm as if perceiving a personal reflection in a mirror or concentrating on her own self-image as a potential sitter. Pausing for a moment
of contemplation, she engages in the active state of painting. The tools of her trade are held in her
left hand, poised for further accomplishment. These include palette, brushes, and mahlstick, used to
steady and brace her right hand. Securing and exhibiting these pictorial attributes, van Hemessen grips
a narrow brush and begins to paint. Within the confines of her occupation, she otherwise communicates a culturally imposed, unpretentious demeanor expected of the female gender and a 16th-century
professional.
In the Self-Portrait, van Hemessen renders a head, perhaps her own visage, on a small panel already
framed and supported on an easel. Appropriately reserved and suitably contented, Caterina appears
confident of her talent. She returns the audience’s gaze, forcing the spectator to read the painter as the
subject rather than the object of the portrait. Reinforcing van Hemessen’s likeness is an inscription on
the wall behind the artist that reveals “I Catharina de Hemessen painted myself aged twenty years.”42
images of aristocratic women playing musical instruments. See Friedlander, 18–21, for a discussion of the “Master of the
Female Half-Lengths.”
39 Karel van Mander’s first edition of the Schilderboeck (Dutch and Flemish Painters) was published in 1604.
40 Baltimore Walters Museum of Art, W. 26, folio 64. Psalter. Initial “Q” with Claricia. Reproduced in J. J. G. Alexander,
Medieval Illuminators and their Methods of Work, New Haven and London, 1992, 20, figure #31.
41 Boccaccio, Le Livre des Femmes Nobles et Renommées. MS Français 12410, Folio 101, Back, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris.
42 G. Perry, Gender and Art, New Haven and London, 1999, 40. See also De Girolami Cheney, A. Craig Faxon, and K. L.
Russo, Self-Portraits by Women Painters, Aldershot and Brookfield, 2000, 44, who translate this inscription as “I Caterina
De Hemessen painted myself in 1546, at the age of 20.” These authors transcribe a date of 1546, two years earlier than the
generally accepted dating of 1548 for this portrait.
22
Fig. 1-10. Caterina van Hemessen, Self-Portrait at the Easel, Basel, Öffentliche
Kunstsammlung.
Did van Hemessen’s Self-Portrait provide an early model for Sofonisba Anguissola or conceptual
paradigm for Lavinia Fontana? Were these Italian artists of the same gender aware of van Hemessen’s
self-image?43 Was there a Spanish connection? Although Sofonisba painted this self-portrait prior to
arriving at the Spanish court (late 1550s), both van Hemessen and Sofonisba worked at the court
of Philip II. Van Hemessen served the king’s aunt, Mary of Hungary, and Sofonisba worked for the
king’s wife, Queen Isabel of Valois. Although the latter painter, Sofonisba, may not have seen the actual
43 Joanna Woods-Marsden, Renaissance Self-Portraits, New Haven and London, 1998, 204. Professor Woods-Marsden asks
this same question.
23
Self-Portrait, it is possible, perhaps through verbal description or a drawing no longer extant, that she
was aware of van Hemessen’s self-image.
While engaged in the active state of painting (similar to the allegory of the same name)44 Caterina
van Hemessen’s Self-Portrait otherwise functions as a behavioral model that parallels the modest, but
not necessarily silent and submissive attitude anticipated by a young female living in 16th-century
Flanders. The painter’s clothing demonstrates a cognizance of appropriate attire to reflect female
comportment. A headdress covers her hair just enough to reveal a parted dark coif, and a black dress
of velvety, soft fabric, small collar, and rose-red sleeves demurely clothes her. With a Mona Lisa smile
befitting her gender but remaining intriguing to read and evaluate, her self-image dominates the welldefined spatial realm within the painting. The darkened ambiguous background provides a foil for the
confident painterly presence, exposing pride in the visual transcription of creativity.
In a second painting by van Hemessen, Young Woman Playing the Virginals of 1548 in Cologne (Fig.
1-11, Wallraf-Richartz Museum), the painter fashions the theme of a young woman playing music.
Crafted in the same year as the signed and dated self-image discussed above,45 the young artist (or her
sister who was two years older) exhibits herself as a noblewoman. Similar to self-portraits of later Italian
painters, Lavinia Fontana and Sofonisba Anguissola, the virginals suggest that the young woman was
an educated member of the noble class who wanted to be read as proficient on this novel instrument
developed in the mid-16th century. As suggested by Castiglione in The Courtier (discussed earlier in
this chapter), while a woman was expected to learn to play music to entertain the court, a professional
career was never the anticipated goal.
Van Hemessen might have additionally included the virginals in the portrait to promote an important craft of Antwerp, the city that was also the celebrated center of virginal building in western Europe.
Indeed, constructors of virginals were members of the same guild as the painters, the Guild of St. Luke.
“Their production aimed mainly at the prosperous citizens, who were very happy to have themselves
portrayed with these musical instruments.”46 Caterina van Hemessen may have known Joannes Kareest,
who was distinguished as a worthy virginal builder of the period. He petitioned in 1547 along with
nine others to become a member of the Guild of St. Luke and signed the petition to join the guild as
a citizen of Antwerp and a builder of harpsichords.47 Also, the scale of the virginals in van Hemessen’s
painting is the correct proportion to those designed by Kareest (5 ft. or 143.4 cm).48 A virginal built by
him in 1548, the same year Caterina painted the Young Woman Playing the Virginals, survives today at
44 Cesare Ripa was the first to codify allegorical personifications. See Cesare Ripa, Edward A. Maser, ed., Baroque and Rococo
Pictorial Imagery, New York, 1971, 197 and plate following.
45 Harris and Nochlin, 105, do not think that this is a self-portrait but rather a portrait of Caterina’s sister, who was two years
older than the painter. H. Liebaers, V. Vermeersch, L. Voet, F. Baudouin, and R. Hoozee, Flemish Art, New York, 1985, 351,
identify this painting (Wallraf-Richartz Museum at Cologne) as a self-portrait of Catherine van Hemessen. Cheney, Faxon
and Russo, 44 and 45, plate IV.2, the authors of the recent Self-Portraits by Women Painters, also identify this painting as a
self-portrait by Caterina van Hemessen. They transcribe the inscription as: “I Caterina De Hemessen painted myself in 1548,
at the age of 22.” They date the Self-Portrait of Caterina painting a self-image two years earlier, in 1546.
46 Flemish Art, 350–351.
47 Ibid., 350–351.
48 Ibid.
24
Fig 1-11. Caterina van Hemessen, Young Woman Playing the Virginals,
Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz Museum.
the Museum of Musical Instruments in Brussels.49 Further, van Hemessen presents the painting from
an aerial perspective with emphasis on the player’s hands, instrument keys, and strings of the virginals.
It seems obvious that the painter chose to advertise the beautiful instrument together with the talented
young woman who performs on it.
In addition to the courtly guise of the youthful performer and the promotion of one of the city’s finest crafts, musical instruments were also employed in visual culture to suggest the auditory sense, one
of the five senses. Popularly recorded in painterly images and prints in the 16th and 17th centuries, the
sense of hearing was often personified as a figure playing a musical instrument.50 The sitter illustrated
in van Hemessen’s painting, Young Woman Playing the Virginals, wears a head covering that is similar to
49 Ibid., 351.
50 Dirck Hals painted The Five Senses (The Hague, Mauritshuis) and Jan Saenredam engraved The Five Senses (after drawings
by Golzius). See S. Slive, Frans Hals, Exhibition Catalogue, Washington, DC, London and Haarlem, 1989–1990, Figs. 15e
and 15f.
25
the painter-sitter in Self-Portrait at the easel. Produced in the same year of 1548, both portrait sitters
appear on panels that are approximately the same size and may have been intended as pendants, to be
exhibited together. Using her own image or perhaps her sister’s, the artist conveys this popular theme
connected to the auditory sense. The two paintings read in conjunction, van Hemessen’s Self-Portrait in
the process of painting and her Young Woman Playing the Virginals, might suggest a similar connotation,
a representation of the senses of sight and hearing.
In 1654, Caterina married a musician (perhaps another argument that the Young Woman Playing the
Virginals is a self-image) named Chrétien de Morien, and two years later Mary of Hungary welcomed
the newly married couple at the court of Philip II (her nephew) in Spain.51 Although well provided
for through the will of Mary,52 there is little indication of van Hemessen’s painterly activity after her
marriage. Similar to the later Baroque painter Judith Leyster, once wedded, Caterina’s priorities turned
to the more traditional female obligations of raising a family.
Internalized as the “weaker” gender, women painters made strong visual statements in self-images
that resisted and rescinded this patriarchal concept. Humble but cognizant, strong yet modest and
proud professional women, the female other went beyond the requisite boundary of modesty to
emerge as recognized artists of Early Modern Europe.
the italian renaissance
Unique opportunity for artistic commissions evolved in early-16th-century Bologna, a papal city-state
that also served as fertile ground for the emergence and recognition of female artists and enlightened
patrons. Why was Bologna such an important geographical site for the visual arts? Diverse influences
and foreign visitors to Bologna, a popular “commercial route” from Northern Italy to Rome,53 stimulated the visual arts of this city-state. Further, in order to avoid the bubonic plague that was consuming
Northern Italy, the Council of Trent was moved to Bologna and with it brought an increased population of learned men.
In part, the culture of Bologna was historically more flexible and promoted novel ideas that included the addition of female intellects. Creative women were more readily accepted because there
were small numbers of them.54 But other social foundations encouraged artistic challenges by women.
The establishment of the University of Bologna by the 11th century, dependence upon sacred patronage from local church “fathers” and the papacy, and devotion to St. Catherine of Bologna (a cleric and
painter) may have promoted the development of female artistic production.55
51 Nochlin and Sutherland, 105. See also Borzello, Seeing Ourselves, 49.
52 B. Wallen, Jan van Hemessen, Ann Arbor, 1976, 21.
53 Caroline P. Murphy, Lavinia Fontana, New Haven and London, 2003, 3.
55 W. Chadwick, Women, Art, and Society, London, 1990, 80. See also
Greer, 208–209.
26
properzia De’ rossi (ca. 1490–1530)
The Renaissance sculptor from Bologna, Properzia de’ Rossi
(Fig. 1-12), was described by Giorgio Vasari as a good manager, achieving success commensurate with male competitors. She began her career carving gemstones and miniatures
from the shells of nuts, cherry, and peach stones (Fig. 1-12a)
and designing jewelry and later accomplished more monumental sculpture in marble, the first of her gender.56 Carlo
Cesare Malvasia, a Baroque chronicler of artists, likewise
cited Properzia as a model for Elisabetta Sirani, a later female
painter from Bologna.57
Similar to other singular Italian Renaissance women artists, Properzia was born of upper-class stature (for Vasari,
all Renaissance women artists were noble and virtuous!).
Fig. 1-12. Portrait of Properzia de Rossi,
Similar to Leonardo da Vinci, Properzia’s father was a notary.
Illustration from “Le Vite” by Giorgio
This profession warranted a privileged status in Bologna and
Vasari, edition of 1568.
appropriate training in the production of art for his daughter.
As explained earlier in this chapter, Castiglione recommended schooling in art and music for nobility, but few women progressed from avocation to occupation in
their accomplishments.
Surviving material about Properzia’s life depends upon Vasari’s account that was transcribed as a
result of a journey to Bologna, allowing him time to complete his fresco in the church of San Michele in
Bosco and to pursue the study of artists from the same geographic area.58 Vasari narrates two occasions
in which Properzia de Rossi was taken to court. In 1520 she was accused of “disturbing the peace,” and
in 1525 she was alleged to have made a “nighttime assault on the painter Vincenzo Miola.”59 Vasari
assures his reader that although a mistress of a nobleman and later criticized by a jealous male artist,
Properzia was renowned in Bologna for her artistic skill.
Although her untimely death is recorded, a date of birth has not been firmly established. She
died of the plague in 1530, a premature death, alone and isolated in a hospital and penniless, without
knowledge of a missed opportunity of a papal commission.60 Despite this acknowledgment from the
pope, Vasari’s commentary additionally reinforced apparent antagonism from the sculptor’s male
compatriots regarding her talent. Clearly, this hostility might have influenced potential patrons and
regrettably informed Properzia’s identity as a sculptor.
58 P. L. Rubin, Giorgio Vasari: Art and History, New Haven and London, 1995, 124.
59 V. Fortunati, Lavinia Fontana of Bologna 1552–1614, Exhibition Catalogue, The National Museum of Women in the Arts,
February 5–June 7, 1998, 120.
60 Unaware that Properzia had succumbed to the plague, Pope Clement VII requested artistic commissions soon after his
election to the papacy. See Harris and Nochlin, 27. E. H. Fine, Women and Art, Montclair and London, 1978, 9.
Fig. 1-12a. Properzia de Rossi, Crest of the Grassi Family, Bologna,
Museo Civico Medievale.
27
Extant records suggest that
Properzia received prestigious commissions. Like Lorenzo Ghiberti of
a century earlier who designed the
doors of the Florentine Baptistery,
Properzia participated in an artistic
contest to determine who would
complete the exterior adornment
on the western side of the Basilica
of San Petronio in Bologna that was
begun in 1390. Embellishment for
the church facade was initiated in
the early decades of the 15th century
by Jacopo della Quercia, but was
not completed by the subsequent
century. From 1425–1438, della
Quercia designed and executed the
famous scenes from Genesis that
frame the decorative portal and
principal entryway into the church.
It is possible that Properzia was
required to follow Jacopo’s original
designs. The positive outcome of the
competition ensured Properzia the
prospect of carving several sculptures that included a sibyl (ancient
female prophetess), an angel, and
two relief carvings of Old Testament
stories.61 The surviving biblical
theme represents Joseph and the Wife
of Potiphar.62
61 Fine, 8. Professor Fine refers to the records of payment that she cites from L. Ragg, Women Artists of Bologna, London,
1907. Whitney Chadwick, 83, refers to both panels and titles, Visit of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon and Joseph and Potiphar’s
Wife (c. 1520). Vasari mentions only one panel, but from church documents, it is apparent that Properzia received money
for two pictures (or panels). N. H. Bluestone, “The Female Gaze: Women’s Interpretations of the Life and Work of Properzia
de’ Rossi, Renaissance Sculptor,” included in N. H. Bluestone, ed., Double Vision: Perspectives on Gender and the Visual Arts,
London and Toronto, 1995, 39 and 53. I had the privilege of seeing these two works in the Museum of San Petronio in
November of 2000. The reliefs appear to be recently restored and emerge more clearly elucidated than in photographs. While
my intent is not to play connoisseur, the two works function together iconographically as well as pictorially. The movement
of the figures in both panels reinforces the pendant panel. The theme, as discussed in the text, provides positive and negative
models through biblical narrative for the woman of Bologna.
62 Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar is universally attributed to Properzia de’ Rossi.
28
Was gender a consideration in choice of
artist? Although she won the competition,
the reliefs were never placed on the facade
of San Petronio. They were assigned to a less
important position where their presence was
regarded as harmless.63 Obviously skilled in her
profession, Properzia dealt with the hostility
toward being a woman in a male profession.
She was courageous and capable of competing
with other artists despite this unique challenge
of being a woman.
Properzia’s sculptural relief, Joseph and the
Wife of Potiphar (Fig. 1-13, 1525–1526), is
reproduced in many books on women artists.
The subject has been regarded as a biblical
reference to a real event in Properzia’s own life
because, according to Vasari, she was the “mistress” of a “nobleman” named Anton Galeazzo
Malvasia.64 It is apparent, however, that the
Fig. 1-13. Properzia de Rossi, Joseph and the Wife of
story of Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar had far
Potiphar, Bologna, Museo di San Petronio.
greater import to Christianity than the personal
choice of an artist. It seems incomprehensible
that the sculptor would have been given substantial flexibility in the option of biblical narrative to carve as decoration for San Petronio, the most
impressive church in Bologna. Properzia, nonetheless, was most likely allowed greater freedom in how
she would depict the theme, rather than the selection of the particular biblical episode.
The text of Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife (see below) continues the life of Joseph upon his arrival in
Egypt. The story is a familiar one. Envious of the coat of many colors given to him by his father Jacob,
Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery. When he arrived in Egypt, Potiphar, a general in the pharaoh’s
army and a eunuch, acquired him to manage his household. Potiphar’s wife, like other renowned biblical women, was given no specific name and for this reason was called the Wife of Potiphar. “Smitten”
and left alone in the house with her husband’s manservant Joseph, she attempted to seduce him. Joseph
ran out of the room leaving only his cloak in her arms. When required to explain the circumstance to
her husband, she used the clothing as evidence against him, saying that Joseph had tried to rape her.
Joseph, an innocent victim, had no opportunity to defend himself against the deceptive charges. As
a consequence of the false accusation and despite his innocence, Joseph was imprisoned. He proves
himself in jail and remains an embodiment of restraint for repelling the Wife of Potiphar. Similar to
63 Fortunati, 33–34.
64 Ibid.
29
the biblical heroine Susanna, with whom he is sometimes paired,65 he emerges in the visual arts as an
image of chastity.
The most dramatic moment of the biblical chronicle, the failed seduction (or more appropriately,
the attempted rape), is also the most popularly represented account of the story.
Now it happened on a certain day, that Joseph went into the house, and was doing some
business without any man with him; and she [the Wife of Potiphar] catching the skirt of
his garment, said: Lie with me. But he, leaving the garment in her hand, fled, and went out
(Genesis 39:12–13).
In depicting the subject, Properzia follows tradition. In the marble relief Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar,
action occurs from right to left dividing the sculpture into two equal parts. On the right, the Wife of
Potiphar is seated on a canopied bed tenaciously gripping the mattress with her left hand. She extends her
right arm toward the fleeing Joseph and attempts to grasp his cloak. Dressed in soft, diaphanous clothing,
which reveals rather than disguises, the Wife of Potiphar’s intimate form is enhanced by the transparent
fabric. Despite the profile
perspective, her breasts
have fallen out of her dress
and are fully exposed to
the beholder’s gaze (Fig.113a).66 Flying clothing and
hair reinforce the spontaneous momentum of
the biblical scene. Even in
assertive stance, her body
language appears demure.
When the biblical
event is pictorially conveyed, the background
is customarily stark but
requires some narrative Fig. 1-13a. Detail. Properzia de Rossi, Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar, Bologna,
detail that include a Museo di San Petronio.
bed, Jacob’s cloak, and
commonly some sparse
clothing for Potiphar’s Wife. Properzia’s relief is clearly told. In its simplicity, the passage is easily communicated to the beholder (a necessary consequence of church facades that were intended to teach or
dictate the word of God to the worshipper while entering the sacred space of the church). The carved
65 Lucas van Leyden represented the stories of Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar and Susanna and the Elders in two paintings that
were intended to be exhibited together.
66 In the Baroque, Orazio Gentileschi represented Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar using a similar open bodice and exposed
breasts.
30
relief represents the most common and sensational semblance of the story. Properzia has chosen to
portray the image of Joseph retreating from the physical confines of the bedroom and withdrawing from
psychological exposure to Potiphar’s Wife.
In “an inversion of traditional gender roles,” the Wife of Potiphar “gains power over a vulnerable,
innocent male,” by way of her “gaze and touch.”67 Potiphar’s Wife sees Joseph, but Joseph turns in flight,
away from her sustained gaze. We encounter Potiphar’s Wife observing the departing Joseph. She
“experiences the pleasure of looking”68 that is customarily provided for the gaze of the male beholder.
Despite the profile presentations, both images display a sensitive introspection that reveals rather
than masks their emotions. According to Vasari in his accounts from The Lives, the display of emotion
was a necessary painterly technique. Properzia demonstrates this hierarchy of emotions with great
proficiency.
Properzia’s Joseph looks like a capable hero. Different from images of Joseph in which he is portrayed
as smaller, more youthful and less heroic (and sometimes nude)69 than Potiphar’s Wife, the sculptor
attempted to demonstrate a relationship of equality. As a woman, Properzia would have questioned
how such an event might have taken place. In relationship to the story, from Potiphar’s perspective, a
brawny man could more easily have overcome his wife and raped her than one who was less powerfully
endowed.
Classical inspiration is perceptible in Properzia’s choice of clothing and the idealized human
form that demonstrate an influence of Greco-Roman models. Readily available on the same church
facade, Jacopo della Quercia’s reliefs informed Properzia’s approach to hands, feet, and facial features.
Michelangelo had also spent a year in Bologna at the beginning of his career. During the sojourn, he
executed three small statues (two saints and an angel) for the tomb of San Domenico (in the church
of the same name) that was begun in the 13th century by Nicola Pisano (1267). Niccolo dell’Arca additionally contributed his talent to the tomb in the late 15th century. The youthful sculptor, Properzia
de Rossi, could neither have avoided nor resisted these earlier sources of inspiration.
The subject of Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife has a consequential potential for more overt sexual
context. Perhaps for the purpose of warning men about the evil powers of women (a popular fear of
Medieval and Renaissance man), the inherent eroticism is precisely what later artists prefer to exploit.
An explicit example is an early etching of Rembrandt dated 1634, Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar, which
represents a more than eager Wife of Potiphar and a repulsed image of Joseph. Indeed, the theme was
frequently represented from the 6th to the 16th centuries.70 By the hand of a female sculptor working in
Renaissance Italy, the interpretation appears surprisingly far more lascivious than sedate. This conceivably reinforces the capability of Properzia to fulfill, successfully and professionally, the terms of the
commissioned subject.
67 Diane Wolfthal, Images of Rape (Cambridge, 1999), 162 as well as 161–179.
68 Ibid.
69 Ibid.
70 See Wolfthal for a more complete discussion of the subject of Joseph and the Wife of Potiphar and earlier representations
of the theme. It is apparent from a study of Baroque art that the subject continues to be popularly depicted throughout the
17th century.
31
In a publication from about a decade ago, Diane Wolfthal asks if it is anatomically possible for a
woman to rape a man.71 The story of Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife addresses this question, which is
similar to the classical legend of Aurora and Cephalus (see Part 2). In addition to Potiphar’s wife, other
biblical women like Eve, the daughters of Lot, Tamar and Delilah, also symbolize the deceitful female
gender. Although often “willing victims,” the male gender succumbs to the evils of the lascivious female in narratives that tell a similar tale of passion and betrayal. The most intriguing question perhaps
is how, in terms of artistic and iconographical problem solving, a female sculptor conceived and carved
the depiction of a woman attempting to rape a man. Properzia de’ Rossi was auspicious in her singular
perception of conveying the dramatic biblical event.
Questions remain to be addressed. For example, how did the female gaze inform these Old
Testament stories? In what way did the women of Bologna interpret and internalize these stories of the
diverse biblical characters of the Queen of Sheba and The Wife of Potiphar? Potiphar’s wife appears in
direct contrast to the Virgin Mary as an image of perfection and Mother of God. Were they intended
to excite or warn the worshipper of the potential “evils” of women? Pictorially conveyed moral lessons
were obviously dictated by the church fathers in an attempt to control the “natural and lustful” desires
of the female gender, prominently exhibited on church entrances that also framed images of Eve and
other “contemptuous” women from the Bible.
In comparison to Florence, where creative access to the female gender was less common or denied,
some of the most important artists of the female hegemony were born in Bologna or trained in this
city of unusually talented women. Perhaps a more pervasive study of Florentine female patronage may
prove to be an equally worthy project.72
As Whitney Chadwick proposes in Women, Art, and Society, the exceptionally cultivated women of
Bologna and the foundation that supported their accomplishment merit further investigation.73 In addition to Properzia de’ Rossi, who was the only woman recorded in the first edition of The Lives,74 Vasari
lauded the talented women who succeeded her, including Lavinia Fontana, Sofonisba Anguissola, and
Barbara Longhi (Italian, 1552–1638).
lavinia Fontana (1552–1614)
The painter Lavinia Fontana flourished in the same city-state of Bologna as her compatriot, the
sculptor Properzia de’ Rossi. Other women artists benefited from the ambiance and patronage of 16thcentury Bologna that was unique to Early Modern Europe. Evidence of Lavinia’s creativity is housed
today in galleries and museums in the United States (Wellesley, Baltimore, Boston, and New York)
and on the European continent (Milan, Venice, Bologna, Florence, Rome, Dresden, Madrid, Rouen,
and Stockholm). In 1998, the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C., hosted a
71 Ibid., 161–162.
72 For further discussion regarding female Florentine patrons, see C. King, Renaissance Women Patrons, Manchester and New
York, 1998. For women patrons, see C. Lawrence, ed., Women and Art in Early Modern Europe, University Park, 1997.
73 W. Chadwick, Women, Art, and Society, London and New York, 1990, 82.
74 Woods-Marsden, 189.
32
monumental exhibit of her work.75 More recently staged in the same national museum, she was part of
an exhibit titled Italian Women Artists from Renaissance to Baroque (2007). Caroline Murphy’s Lavinia
Fontana (published in 2003) contributed as well to our understanding of this Renaissance painter.
Our knowledge of Lavinia Fontana depends upon an abbreviated life recorded by Carlo Cesare
Malvasia (1616–1693). Fontana was a sought-after portrait artist of Bologna whose female patrician
class commissioned painted self-images and devotional panels. She worked for the papal court in
Rome of Gregory XIII and his family, the Boncompagni. Fontana’s wealthy patrons requested that she
execute portraits of distinctly female life passages, portraying them as brides, mothers, and widows.76
These same wealthy women solicited sacred altarpieces for religious foundations in the city-state and
paintings for private devotion. Although women in the middle or lower classes might have had opportunities to commission art as a group venture (such as nuns in a convent), noblewomen had the
financial resources to authorize individual paintings or sculpture. Daughters or wives of physicians and
attorneys especially took advantage of their rank and economic base to request independent pictorial
works.77 In addition to the importance assigned to financial security in commissioning works of art,
Castiglione in The Courtier (discussed above) regarded lessons in painting and drawing as valuable
skills and familiar obligations of courtly women. Sofonisba Anguissola instructed the queen of Spain
and her daughter in the art of painting, and likewise Lavinia Fontana was involved in teaching art to
female nobility in Bologna.
The foundation for Lavinia’s professional career was dependent upon a substantial relationship
with her father, the painter Prospero Fontana. The creative gene also issued from her mother, Antonia
de Bonardis, who “came from a family of respected typographers.”78 Unlike a son, a father’s female heir
could bear children, but could not affirm the endowment of the family name. As an only child and
a daughter, she was regarded as an heir entitled to the economic legacy and emotional estate of her
family. She inherited her father’s aesthetic gift as well. Prospero Fontana encouraged his daughter’s
painterly ability and enhanced her receipt of necessary artistic training that included inspiration from
Raphael, Correggio, Parmigianino, and later the Carracci. “Her father’s house also served as her library,
containing prints, engravings, drawings, emblem books, and literature. Additionally, it was the place
where she could observe and listen to the ‘virtuous’ people of the time who visited her father in his
studio.”79
In the diminutive Self-Portrait in the Studiolo (or Study) (Fig. 1-14), Lavinia Fontana perceives
herself in the guise of a scholar surrounded by favorite intellectual and artistic treasures. Seated at a
desk in her richly appointed study, she holds a pen, resting on paper. Her signature and date appear
directly on a text that lies on the surface of the same table. Two sculptures, perhaps dependent upon
75 See Lavinia Fontana of Bologna, above citation #28.
76 C. P. Murphy, “Lavinia Fontana and Female Life Cycle Experience in Late Sixteenth-Century Bologna,” included in G. A.
Johnson and S. F. Matthews Grieco, eds., Picturing Women in Renaissance and Baroque Italy, Cambridge and New York, 1997,
111–138.
77 C. King, 1998, 10.
78 Lavinia Fontana of Bologna, 13.
79 Ibid.
33
Fig. 1-14. Lavinia Fontana, Self-Portrait in a Studiolo (or Study), Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi, Corridoro
Vasariano.
ancient art, are displayed on the desk. Her refined demeanor and ornate clothing denote an attitude of
self-confidence, as well as a cognizance of notoriety and profession.
Similar to her portrait-painter father, Lavinia took up the brush to visually record facial features of
Bolognese society that principally included noblewomen during prevailing life cycles of matrimony,
maternity, and widowhood.80 She painted portraits of young women in their teens who had succumbed
to arranged marriages as was required by their class, religious paintings that ensured progeny after marriage, and finally she fashioned portrayals at the age of loss and widowhood. Lavinia appears to have
been an exceptional artist and also one who was trusted and sought after in wealthy womanly circles.
80 Murphy, 1997, 112.
34
As a member of the female gender, she could well understand and articulate, in a painterly medium, the
necessary requirements of distinguished sitters and their special demands at commonly acknowledged
times in their lives.
Lavinia gained celebrity status in Bologna as suggested in Carlo Cesare Malvasia’s biographies of
the Life of the Bolognese Painters. Noblewomen vied for her attention and provoked competition for her
portraits, which became collectible and distinguished status symbols for them. According to Caroline
Murphy:
For some time, all the Ladies of the City would compete in wishing to have her close to
them, treating her and embracing her with extraordinary demonstrations of love and respect, considering themselves fortunate to have seen her on the street, or have meetings in
the company of the virtuous young woman; the greatest thing that they desired would be
to have her paint their portraits, prizing them in such a way that in our day no greater prices
could be charged by a Vandych [sic] …81
Portraits and religious paintings, both private commissions and public donations, furnish the
foundation for Fontana’s accomplishments. The achievement of painting sacred subjects without the
privilege of traditional academic training is especially remarkable. Lacking the formal instruction of
drawing from the unclothed model—the nude male was proscribed to female artists—impacted most
women’s careers. Like the ancient Roman painter Marcia (see earlier discussion), who “refused to draw
men so as to avoid seeing them naked,”82 Lavinia may have been prohibited the opportunity of studying
male models. Despite this necessary exercise, Lavinia obtained proficiency in the rendering of human
form, and in fact painted “even male and female nudes.”83 Her reputation, however, rests on her ability
to fashion portraits of patrician women.
What are the necessary components of portraiture and aristocratic likeness for a painter of noble
patrons? Portraits provide not only a physical affinity to the sitter as required by subject, but they also
serve as a type of sociological study. The sitter’s body adornment and physical stature that include
clothing (it might be called the sociology or psychology of clothing), fabric color, jewelry, hairstyle,
facial features (as in bone structure), placement of hands and psychological attitude (emotional expression or lack thereof and figural pose), signify a social rank in place and time. These consequential
attributes furnish a basis for deciphering and understanding history.
How did the Renaissance patron want to look? Of primary concern was decorum, which was
visually conveyed through a minimalist approach to emotion. While the facial facade reflects less the
psychology of the individual, the emotional visage might be limited in terms of exposure to the public
gaze. Few portrait painters attempted to penetrate the surface like Leonardo did in the Mona Lisa. Most
preferred a “cool” or aloof presentation that preempted reality and any hint of emotion. In accordance
81 C. P. Murphy, “Lavinia Fontana and Le Dame della Citta: Understanding female artistic patronage in late sixteenth-century
Bologna,” Renaissance Studies: Journal of the Society for Renaissance, 1996, 190.
82 B. Buettner, Boccaccio’s Des cleres et nobles femmes, Seattle and London, 1996, 61.
35
with their stature, we can assume that the sitters wanted to look good. Lavinia Fontana reinforced their
expectations to noble status.
Since portraiture was not a spontaneous procedure (unlike yesterday’s camera “snapshot” or today’s
digital camera, where the desired image is framed in only seconds), the artist was forced to create in the
isolation of a studio, becoming a visual problem solver in fashioning the desired stature. In a more complicated and painstaking process that involved many sittings and studies, the final production evolved.
The purpose of the portrait—betrothal, marriage or widowhood—would dictate the presentation in
terms of attitude and clothing. For example, stature and beauty were essential considerations, along
with an idealization or a realistic interpretation of the sitter. Sumptuous attire for a bride might be
deemed more appropriate than the subdued clothing of a widow. The portrait signified the wealth of
family and principally the prosperity of father and husband. Portraits painted by women of women (or
for women), however, addressed the noble sitter differently from portraits of women produced by men.
In 1603, Lavinia moved to Rome, where she was readily acknowledged as a painter of portraits.
She was elected to the Roman Academy of Art, providing her with an economic basis for her future
success. The potential to afford
Lavinia’s Roman paintings limited
access to noble patrons. Her portraits demonstrate sensitivity to the
introspective interpretation of her
sitters. Meticulous description of
fabrics and textural variety further
prove her remarkable ability.
One of Lavinia’s most impressive paintings, Portrait of a
Noblewoman (Fig. 1-15, ca. 1580),
resides in Washington, D.C., at the
National Museum of Women in
the Arts. In the portrait, the artist
depicts a youthful woman standing
near a ledge or table that supports a
reverent dog. Upright, on his hind
legs, the small white bejeweled pup
with a brown masklike face and ears
looks adoringly at its mistress. The
noblewoman places her hand gently
on the dog’s back to reassure her devotion. At the same time, she looks
in another direction as if perceiving
someone entering the intimate
pictorial space. The reason for the Fig. 1-15. Lavinia Fontana, Portrait of a Noblewomen, Washington
inclusion of the dog depends upon D.C., National Museum of Women in the Arts.
36
its specific context. In a wedding portrayal, the presence of a dog signifies the function of the painting. Lavinia’s Portrait of a Noblewoman is typically agreed to be an engagement or marriage portrait.
Symbolizing marital fidelity, the small animal has a similar purpose to the canine depicted at the feet of
the bride, Giovanna Cenami, in Jan van Eyck’s Arnolfini Wedding Portrait (Fig. 1-16). Resurrecting an
archaic image of allegiance and marital loyalty, the dog often appeared in relief at the feet of deceased
women carved on ancient Roman tombs.
The self-contained, splendidly dressed noblewoman is placed against a darkened background from
which she appears as three-dimensional. Without the additional decorative device of an architectural
setting, Lavinia has created a believable ambiance that includes the pictured sphere. The sitter’s head
is tilted slightly downward and is supported by a stand-up collar and an additional lace cuff that both
imprisons and camouflages her neck. The clothing accoutrements reinforce her stature and regal appearance. An elegant demeanor raises her to a level beyond the painterly audience, and Lavinia creates
a paradigm for aristocratic portraits, a credit that is usually reserved for the Flemish painter Anthony
Van Dyck, to whom she is compared (in terms of extravagant expense of her paintings). In contrast to
female portrayals of the 17th century, the Portrait of a Noblewoman esteems the sitter as an intelligent,
capable young woman. Her self-assured manner illustrates a competence that will furnish sustenance
and counsel to her future husband, an essential component of aristocratic marriages. Unlike the demure Arnolfini bride (mentioned above), Lavinia’s stately Noblewoman is not reticent in her anticipated
role of prospective wife, consummate mother, and enduring noblewoman.
The portrait sitter wears a brilliant red dress with a tightly fitting bodice, heavily laden with inestimable gems and precious metal. Since red is the color of passion (i.e., the Passion of Christ or
the martyred saints), perhaps here it represents secular desire associated with the consummation of
the marriage. The color red was made from crushed Chinese beetles and imported into Italy. For this
reason, it was also a very expensive pigment, reinforcing the extravagance of her gown. Around her
waist hangs a gold, jeweled belt that extends along the front of her dress. Attached to this is a marten
skin (also identified as sable) that “can often be found in portraits of upper-class women, who used
them to draw fleas away from their bodies and clothes.”84 According to medieval bestiaries, the marten
was also a symbol of chastity and an appropriate attribute of a noble bride.
The impressive clothing or marriage costume and the opulent jewelry that the bride took to her new
family reinforce the identity of the young noblewoman. Considered a part of her bridal gift or dowry,
the luxurious apparel was in the possession of her groom and afterward controlled by her husband.
He [the husband] could, if he wished, sell them to realize hard cash after the wedding,
although to do so was unusual. However, the garments and their wearer would appear at
their most glorious during the days of the wedding celebrations.
After the marriage, childbirth and successive pregnancies could easily destroy a woman’s
looks and figure, and death might remove her from her husband entirely. Therefore, it was
84 National Museum of Women in the Arts, New York, 1995, 16.
Women Artists of Early Modern Europe 37
Fig. 1-16. Jan van Eyck, Arnolfini Wedding Portrait, London, National Gallery.
38
at the wedding itself that the bride’s worth, her family’s status and the grandeur of the match
were all encapsulated in the bride’s appearance.85
Representing a pictured dowry, the meticulous detail of Lavinia’s noble sitter and the precise care
enlisted by the artist suggests the patron’s primary focus. If we consider the artist’s obligation to bestow
upon the sitter all aspects of temporal passage, then it is necessary to comprehend the significance of
the dowry to the ritual of marriage and within the confines of nobility.
At the time of the birth of a daughter, the new father obtained a dowry for a future wedding. Although
the dowry was a necessary commitment of wedlock, ensuring the alliance was an admirable one, it
could also be an economic burden to the young woman’s family. Since there were no universal rules
regarding the dowry, each Italian city-state developed its own regulations and customs.86 Variations existed from one geographical area to another and within each family, according to the amount of dowry
and what it contained. This bridal gift or dowry was fundamental to the ritual of marriage. Because it
was primary to the concept of matrimony, the dowry furnished the resources through which the young
bride could make an entry into her new family. “When the linens and the personal belongings that
make up her trousseau were sent to the bride’s new dwelling, her family of birth signified that it was
breaking with her in some way, that it was renouncing its rights over her.”87 Like the bride, the physical
transference of the dowry symbolized a political and financial alliance, unifying the two families. The
“countergifts,” or gifts given to the new wife from her husband and his family (for example, a ring or
“foodstuffs”), reinforced their union and subsequent relationship.88
The husband was additionally required to “dress” his wife. While the trousseau was provided by
the bride’s family and became a part of the dowry, the husband often furnished other costly clothing
and jewelry essential to his social class. The wife was not, however, entitled to keep these countergifts.
When her husband died, they could be “repossessed” and returned to his relatives. “The husband
remained, indeed, the virtual proprietor of the objects (dresses, jewelry, furniture) offered to his wife
during the wedding period. What happened to these gifts at the dissolution of the marriage depended
upon his last wishes.”89 Similar gifts that were given to the wife during the marital relationship and in
the course of her life, such as silver cups presented to the young couple to celebrate the birth of a child,
were also considered the property of the husband’s family.90 This unfortunate occurrence happened to
Christine de Pizan, who as a widow was required to return the marriage dowry to her husband’s family
and was forced to earn a living after his death. As a result, the talented woman took up the pen and
became a successful author.
85 Murphy, 1997, 116.
86 C. Klapisch-Zuber, Women, Family and Ritual in Renaissance Italy, trans. L. Cochraine, Chicago and London, 1985, 225.
Klapisch-Zuber uses this term throughout the discussion of dowry.
87 Klapisch-Zuber, 224.
88 Murphy, 1997.
89 Ibid., 225. This is a principal source that provides information about family that includes women and dowry rights in
Florence. I am using the analysis to provide social foundation for the painter Lavinia Fontana, despite her Bologna birth,
because some of the same rules abide.
90 Ibid. See Chapter 10, “The Griselda Complex: Dowry and Marriage Gifts in the Quattrocento,” 213–246, for further
discussion of this remarkable topic.
39
Lavinia Fontana’s ability to convey pictorially the transmission of dowered clothing and the ritual
of marriage demonstrates her appeal to 16th-century noblewomen. Gold metallic jewelry and richly
textured and layered costumes create an opulent demeanor. The contrasts between crisp, white lace
ruffles of collar and cuffs and the lucid pearls, shimmering, translucent gems, heavy, red velvet fabric,
and soft, smooth, creamy features and flesh illustrate the artistic prowess of the portraitist.
The artist carefully places the sitter’s gaze outside of the picture. Neither shy nor sensual, the alert
and intelligent portrait additionally illustrates the artist’s success as a visual communicator of the
female other in Renaissance society. More than 500 years after the portrait was painted, the audience
has no problem in assessing regal stature or tangible signifiers of nobility.
Fontana’s artistic identity seemed to have been established early in her life. At the age of 25 in 1577,
she painted a self-portrait entitled Self-Portrait at the Spinet Accompanied by a Handmaiden (Fig. 1-17).
A Latin inscription included a signature and date: LAVINIA VIRGO PROSPERI FONTANAE/
FILIA EX SPECULO IMAGINEM/ORIS SUI EXPRESIT ANNO/MDLXXVII (Lavinia the unwed
daughter of Prospero Fontana/as a girl made an image of her face from a mirror/in the year 1577).91
The portrait was said to have been a wedding gift to her prospective parents-in-law. Fontana was betrothed in the same year to their son, the painter Giovanni Paolo Zappi.92
In the small painting, Lavinia depicts herself at the keyboard of a spinet, looking out at the spectator. Dressed in sumptuous red clothing, reminiscent of the Portrait of a Noblewoman, she carefully
focuses on the space outside of the painting. Similar to the portrait discussed earlier by Caterina van
Hemessen, Lavinia personifies her noble status by displaying the ability to play a musical instrument.
Behind her a maidservant holds the music. Hidden in the background and illuminated by the window
stands an easel, the only recognizable attribute of her trade. Her self-confident attitude supports her
dignified stature, while the small easel reminds her future husband’s parents of her successful profession as an artist.
The union of Lavinia and Giovanni was a successful one, both professionally and personally. About
135 paintings survive by her hand.93 Her husband supported his wife’s artistic occupation and their
marital relationship. The marriage resulted in the birth of 11 children, but like so many women of the
period, she experienced the demise of eight of her offspring prior to her own death in 1614. Lavinia
Fontana appears as an artistic exemplar of the Renaissance and a 21st-century model of the female
gender. With a balance of profession and progeny, she was one of the first in line to inspire a succession
of female artists.
91 J. Pomeroy, “Forging a Career in the Sixteenth Century: Lavinia Fontana of Bologna, “Women in Arts, vol. XVI, no. 2, spring
1998, 4.
92 J. Woods-Marsden, Renaissance Self-Portraiture, New Haven and London, 1998, 215–216.
93 Fine, 135. See also National Women in the Arts, Catalogue of the Collection, 16.

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