Angelica Kauffmann

WONDER WOMEN: SOFONISBA ANGUISSOLA, LAVINIA FONTANA AND ARTEMISIA GENTILESCHI
A CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF RENAISSANCE AND BAROQUE SELF-PORTRAIT PAINTING BY FEMALE ARTISTS

by Rosa Lena Reed Robinson

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
Master of Arts in Art History at
Studio Art Centers International
Florence, Italy

2017


This  thesis is focused on the self-portrait painting practice by three female artists from the Renaissance and the Baroque periods: Sofonisba Anguissola, Lavinia Fontana, and Artemisia Gentileschi. Chapter I introduces the self-portrait as it developed specific to the Renaissance and in relation to a Greco-Roman classical ideal. The chapter focuses on Renaissance concepts of art and the very role of the artist. Chapter II studies the numerous self-portraits of Sofonisba Anguissola, the first great Renaissance female artist to have an international career. The artist’s self-portraits both became a foundation for those of later female artists and self-consciously expressed the new elite status achieved by this Lombard artist of noble lineage who worked as court portraitist for the Spanish monarchy. Chapter III examines the self-portraits and innovative identity self-portraiture of Lavinia Fontana of Bologna. It is demonstrated how her two early self-portraits built on the precedent established by Sofonisba, and yet, are of somewhat greater iconographic complexity. While in her maturity the artist developed self-portraiture into the identity self-portrait through the subject of Judith and Holofernes. Within her treatments of the theme in some examples she put herself into the figure of Judith and in others into Judith’s maid Abra. Lavinia Fontana’s final masterpiece, the improbable painting Minerva Dressing done at the end of her extensive career was likewise arguably an identity self-portrait. Minerva Dressing constitutes the first female fully nude figure painted by a female artist. Chapter IV focuses on Artemisia Gentileschi. This thesis designates the artist’s Pommersfelden Susanna and the Elders as both Artemisia’s first exact self-portrait and the first female full-length nude self-portrait painted by a female artist. The work is also an identity self-portrait. This chapter continues with a discussion of both versions of Artemisia’s infamous Judith and Holofernes (Capodimonte/Uffizi). Both works are arguably exact self-portrait paintings and identity self-portraits. Artemisia’s Allegory of Painting in London, often referred to as a self-portrait in scholarship, is suggested a perhaps better understood as an ideal identity self-portrait rather than a literal self-representation. The Allegory of Painting is considered together with other attributed self-portraits and portraits of the artist. A major theme in Chapter IV is the transition from literal self-representation to allegorical and ideal portrayal of the self. This thesis suggests that, as the artist’s career advanced, Artemisia Gentileschi did continue to paint both the exact and the ideal self-portrait. Finally, in the Conclusion, the legacy of the self-portraits of the Wonder Women, to adopt a phrase from Giorgio Vasari, is considered in reference to future female artists such as Elisabetta Sirani, Angelica Kauffmann, Elisabeth Vigée Le-Brun and Paula Modersohn-Becker.

Ultimo esponente del casato, Il conte bresciano destinò ai Musei civici di Brescia il palazzo cittadino ora sede della Pinacoteca (insieme al dipinto di Angelica Kaufmann,  il medagliere e la preziosa biblioteca) e a quelli di Venezia (le armi antiche con  la biblioteca moderna e l'archivio di famiglia). Il resto del cospicuo patrimonio, comprendente i beni ereditati dalla  madre Cecilia Michiel furono in seguito dispersi dagli eredi  (opere  notissime di Giovanni Bellini, Bartolomeo Veneto, Giorgione e  Canova). Similmente disperse in tempi diversi  sono inoltre da considerare  le collezioni presenti a Venezia nelle  dimore degli altri casati bresciani ammessi al patriziato cittadino fin dalla metà del Quattrocento. Oltre agli Avogadro (da Pietro), le fonti citano i due rami dei Martinengo da Barco (dai fratelli Vittore e Giovan Maria),  i Martinengo di Padernello (da Antonio), i Martinengo di Cadivilla (da Giacomo) e i Martinengo Colleoni di Malpaga (da Gherardo). Con  cospicui esborsi alla Repubblica si aggiunsero poi l casati Gambara (1653), Martinengo delle Palle (1689) e Martinengo Cesaresco (1779)..

In her article "Private Museums, Public Leadership; Isabella Stewart Gardner and the Art of Cultural Authority" Anne Higonnet discusses how Isabella Stewart Gardner's masterful spatial juxtaposing of objects in her palatial home demonstrated a unique method for the creation of visual narratives (Higonnet 88-90). Higonnet describes an effect at the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum where the juxtaposition of objects and images in a space "refract" meaning with each other. These meanings "compound" to create a collective larger meaning (88). Higonnet argues that the meaning of objects and images in a space refract (reveal a full spectrum of meaning) and compound (combine meanings together) to reveal a different narrative. Refracted and compounded meanings then serve to "mutate" the meaning of the spatial narrative into something different than if the image or objects were seen in isolation.

This paper argues that a close reading of juxtaposed paintings by Angelica Kaufmann and Thomas Sulley, and the Davenant Patent in the main hallway of the Rosenbach Museum historic house demonstrate a refraction of meaning that compounds to mutate the spatial narrative to one of masculine dominance over the feminine and the ability of the feminine to challenge that dominance.

Nelle raccolte grafiche della Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana si conserva un corpus di incisioni di mano della “pittrice delle grazie”, Angelica Kauffmann (Coira, 1741 – Roma, 1807). Si tratta di lavori eseguiti principalmente durante il viaggio di formazione in Italia dell’artista che ebbe luogo tra il 1762 er la prima metà del 1766,. Si trattò di un’esperienza di fondamentale importanza non solo per il suo percorso formativo, arricchito dallo studio diretto di celebri quadrerie principesche e di collezioni private, ma anche per la complessa rete di relazioni che la giovane poté avviare e che, in taluni casi, la accompagnarono per tutta la sua lunga e feconda carriera. Il contributo intende indagare l’origine del nucleo di stampe ambriosiano alla luce dei rapporti che la pittrice intrattenne con svariati esponenti della Lombardia asburgica dagli anni Sessanta del Settecento sino all’affermarsi del governo francese, usufruendo anche di documenti inediti. Si inserisce in questo poco indagato filone di ricerca sulla biografia dell’artista, anche il riutilizzo dell’incisione del ritratto di Joahnn Joachim Winckelmann, uscito dal pennello della stessa Kauffmann, per arricchire l’apparato illustrativo della prima traduzione in lingua italiana del volume Geschichte der Kunst des Alterthums ossia la Storia delle Arti del disegno presso gli antichi, pubblicata a Milano nel 1779 per volontà del governo austriaco

Nelle raccolte grafiche della Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana si conserva un corpus di incisioni di mano della “pittrice delle grazie”, Angelica Kauffmann (Coira, 1741 – Roma, 1807). Si tratta di lavori eseguiti principalmente durante il viaggio di formazione in Italia dell’artista che ebbe luogo tra il 1762 er la prima metà del 1766,. Si trattò di un’esperienza di fondamentale importanza non solo per il suo percorso formativo, arricchito dallo studio diretto di celebri quadrerie principesche e di collezioni private, ma anche per la complessa rete di relazioni che la giovane poté avviare e che, in taluni casi, la accompagnarono per tutta la sua lunga e feconda carriera. Il contributo intende indagare l’origine del nucleo di stampe ambriosiano alla luce dei rapporti che la pittrice intrattenne con svariati esponenti della Lombardia asburgica dagli anni Sessanta del Settecento sino all’affermarsi del governo francese, usufruendo anche di documenti inediti. Si inserisce in questo poco indagato filone di ricerca sulla biografia dell’artista, anche il riutilizzo dell’incisione del ritratto di Joahnn Joachim Winckelmann, uscito dal pennello della stessa Kauffmann, per arricchire l’apparato illustrativo della prima traduzione in lingua italiana del volume Geschichte der Kunst des Alterthums ossia la Storia delle Arti del disegno presso gli antichi, pubblicata a Milano nel 1779 per volontà del governo austriaco.

Two unpublished letters by Angelica Kauffmann to members of the Raimondi family in Como provide new information about the painter’s trip to Central and Northern Italy during summer-autumn 1802. The paper investigates the contents of the two documents focusing on the relationships between Angelica, Italian patrons and cultural élites at the beginning of the XIX century.

Reputation management is a contemporary offshoot of public relations, but reputation has long had economic currency in British culture. Less well studied is the way commercial reputation consolidated around ideas of the brand. This case study of the London career of the Swiss‐born artist Angelica Kauffman (1741‐1807) examines the development of the ‘Angelica' brand: from stage‐managed debut, studio establishment and performance, and self‐promotion through self‐portraiture to market positioning, diffusion lines and pricing strategy. It tests the success of Kauffman's efforts by examining critical reception, consumer response and, finally, damage limitation, concluding that the Angelica brand was the painter's cleverest creation.