Artemisia Gentileschi

In an unpublished manuscript about exemplary women, Cristofano Bronzini described a visit to the Tuscan court by Giovanna Garzoni while she was still in her teens, and transcribed a poem written there in her honour. This new documentary evidence has important implications for understanding Garzoni’s artistic development in the early 1620s.

This second volume in the  Illuminating Women Artists series delves into the life and work of the Baroque painter Artemisia Gentileschi. The book explores the evolution of Gentileschi’s expressive goals and techniques, and contains in-depth discussions of key artworks, such as Susanna and the Elders (1610), Judith Beheading Holofernes (c.1619–20), and Lot and His Daughters (1640–45).

Este artigo discute como a autoria feminina foi apagada da história, e como as histórias contadas pelas mulheres são diferentes do que estamos acostumadxs a ver.

[Text in portuguese] This article discusses how female authorship was erased from history, and how women tell stories differentily of what we are used to see.

Hailed as one of the most influential and expressive painters of the seventeenth century, Artemisia Gentileschi (1593–ca. 1656) has figured prominently in the art historical discourse of the past two decades. This attention to Artemisia, after many years of scholarly neglect, is partially due to interest in the dramatic details of her early life, including the widely publicized rape trial of her painting tutor, Agostino Tassi, and her admission to Florence’s esteemed Accademia del Disegno. While the artist’s early paintings have been extensively discussed, her later work has been largely dismissed.

This beautifully illustrated and elegantly written book provides a revolutionary look at Artemisia’s later career, refuting longstanding assumptions about the artist. The fact that she was semi-illiterate has erroneously led scholars to assume a lack of literary and cultural education on her part. Stressing the importance of orality in Baroque culture and in Artemisia’s paintings, Locker argues for her important place in the cultural dialogue of the seventeenth century.

(Dutch) Onderzoekje naar Genesis 19:30-38, het verhaal van Lot die door zijn dochters verleid wordt, na hun vlucht uit Sodom. Is Lot een rechtvaardige of niet? Zowel de tekst als de receptie ervan laten de ambiguïteit van het antwoord op die vraag zien. Ook de receptie in de 16e en 17e-eeuwse schilderkunst is meegenomen.

On April 8, 1976, a women’s cooperative comprising eleven members variously active in the field of art inaugurated a self-run art gallery in Rome’s city center, at Via Beato Angelico 18. Surprisingly, instead of showing works from the members’ own production, the inaugural exhibition of the Cooperativa Beato Angelico (CBA) brought a baroque artist before the public: Artemisia Gentileschi’s painting Aurora (ca. 1627) was installed on an easel and accompanied by a leaflet featuring archival and bibliographical references. Starting from this remarkable opening, this essay explores the CBA’s expository and archival practices, which were specifically directed at works by female artists past and present. Building on previous research on the cooperative and re-engaging with archival sources and oral memory, I newly focus on the temporal dimensions of the initiative’s activities. First, I unravel the ways in which the CBA participated in countering the structural imbalance of the art-historical canon – a concerted effort effected by the increasing popularization of feminist ideas in the art field at the time. Second, and more importantly, I argue that the cooperative’s distinctive handling of the temporary exhibition and the archive translated into a rejection of conventional models of history-writing. If read in relation to the questioning of chronological and dialectical notions of progress conceptualized in the ambit of 1970s separatist feminism, the CBA’s historiographical tactic – based on a non-linear interweaving of past and present positions – loses its apparent contingency and can instead be reassessed as a focused disruption of the continuum of men’s history. I conclude that women artists from different times, ‘presentified’ and re-signified in the CBA’s exhibitions and archive, thus came to embody feminist thinker Carla Lonzi’s idea of woman as the “unexpected subject”.

Elaborazione in chiave testuale di un evento organizzato al Teatro Vittoria di Roma il 24 gennaio 2014, dal titolo: "Artemisia Gentileschi: l'ardenimento de le femine. Affetti e musica sulla strada tra Roma e Firenze". Ideato e realizzato da Anna Maria Panzera.

La obsesión por los selfie de nuestro tiempo es, quizás, un eco tardío de la pasión barroca por los autorretratos. En éste, que Artemisia Gentileschi pintó para ser colocado en una colección en la que sólo habían autorretratos masculinos, la pintora se representó a sí misma como la personificación femenina de la Pintura, algo que ningún hombre podría haber hecho.

Cristine Tedesco dedicou muitos anos na pesquisa sobre Artemisia Gentileschi, utilizando uma rica bibliografia e variadas fontes documentais e visuais que consultou durante a sua estadia na Itália. Focou seus estudos em fontes como o processo crime sofrido pela pintora, as correspondências da artista, certidões, recibos de pagamentos, encomendas, censos, inventários, epitáfios, poemas e obras pictóricas de Artemisia, analisando construções de si e representações do feminino. A autora evidenciou a identidade de “Artemisia pintora” nos vários contextos históricos em que a artista circulou: Roma, Florença, Veneza, Nápoles e Londres, negociando com os limites de seu tempo e tencionando as fronteiras de gênero vigentes na primeira metade do século XVII. Em sua obra, a artista representou personagens célebres, na sua grande maioria figuras femininas, heroínas trágicas da história romana, bíblica e da mitologia, se autorretratando em muitas delas. São imagens que testemunham a excelência da pintora e sua preocupação em agradar diferentes públicos que consumiam suas obras. Boa leitura! Celso Bordignon.
https://vemdelivery.com.br/loja/livros/artemisia-gentileschi-cristine-tedesco/

Madrid became after its declaration of capital of the Spanish territories one of the most important artistic centres of Europe. This article takes in consideration the practice of pictorial copying in Madrid during the last twenty years of the Iberian Union. In that period, began the copying of the first portraits that Velázquez made of Philip IV, as well as important artists as Bartolomé González devoted their efforts to create pictorial copies. Madrid was also a centre of attraction for foreign painters interested in make copies of the masterpieces in the royal collections, as Peter Paul Rubens or Michael Cross.

Elizabeth S. Cohen rebukes the common misconception of Artemisia Gentileschi's sexuality as being central to her artistic career due to psychological setbacks after her infamous rape by Agostino Tassi. Cohen examines the centuries-old testimonies from the trials that present contextual evidence of the ways in which seventeenth-century Rome viewed and coped with rape, and how our modern views can misconstrue that.

The Author discusses the attitude of Artemisia as a woman and as an artist in the first half of the seventeenth century, analyzing the Gentileschi's visual production and her correspondence, addressed to dealers of her works-among them: merchants, diplomats, dukes, members of art academies and european patrons. The attention is based on the use of images in historical research, problematizing how the Gentileschi's work contributes to think about her time, her culture and her biographical trajectory.

La Autora aborda el papel de Artemisia como mujer y artista en la primera mitad del siglo XVII, mediante el análisis de la producción de imágenes y cartas de la pintora para los negociantes de sus obras-incluyendo comerciantes, diplomáticos, duques, miembros de academias de arte y los mecenates europeos. La perspectiva considera el uso de imágenes en la investigación histórica, problematizando como la opera de Artemisia ayuda a pensar en su tiempo, su cultura y su trayectoria biográfica. Palabras clave: historia, imagen, Artemisia Gentileschi L'Autrice considera il ruolo di Artemisia come donna e artista nella prima metà del XVII secolo, analizzando la produzione di immagini della pittrice e le lettere destinate ai commercianti delle sue opere-tra cui mercanti, diplomatici, duchi, membri di accademie d'arte e mecenati europei. L'attenzione si focalizza sull'uso delle immagini nella ricerca storica, considerando come l'opera di Artemisia contribuisca a pensare il suo tempo, la sua cultura e la sua traiettoria biografica.

L’articolo tenta di delineare un’analisi comparata fra Artemisia (1947) di Anna Banti e To the Lighthouse (1927) di Virginia Woolf, con particolare attenzione ai personaggi di Artemisia e Lily Briscoe, entrambe pittrici. Sebbene la scrittrice inglese sia stata più volte evocata dalla critica bantiana, infatti, mai le due autrici sono state oggetto di uno studio comparativo sistematico: approfondire i possibili legami intertestuali fra Artemisia e Al faro, cui spesso vengono preferite altre opere woolfiane come Orlando o A room of One’s Own, potrebbe pertanto rivelarsi interessante per indagare da un’ulteriore prospettiva la costruzione del primo personaggio di finzione ispirato alla vicenda di Artemisia Gentileschi – a maggior ragione perché nei decenni successivi la pittrice barocca sarà oggetto di un vero e proprio processo di “finzionalizzazione”, fra romanzi, opere teatrali, film, graphic novel, docufiction ecc.

The essay aims to outline a comparative analysis between Anna Banti’s Artemisia (1947) and Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse, with a focus on the characters of Artemisia and Lily Briscoe, both painters. Indeed, even if the English writer was often mentioned by Banti’s critics, the two authors have never been the object of a systematic comparative study. Therefore, the article deepens the potential connections between Artemisia and To the Lighthouse (and not the most quoted Orlando or A room of One’s Own) in order to investigate from a further point of view the construction of the first fictional character inspired by Artemisia Gentileschi - particularly since the baroque painter will be the subject of a massive fictionalising process in the following decades, including novels, plays, films, graphic novels, docufictions etc.

Bibliography on early modern women artists, mainly in Italy and the Netherlands; a sporadic compilation of 45+ pages. Updated 29 April 2020. BUT see now my Bibliography_Premodern Women Artists (posted on 14 May 2020), which has expanded geographically and chronologically, to include medieval women, and female artists and patrons working in China, Japan and Islamic cultures.
AS OF 29 MAY 2020 THE BIBLIOGRAPHY IS NOW A GOOGLE DOC OF 130+ PAGES. IT IS OPEN ACCESS AND COMMENTS ARE WELCOME.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qciG2ndN2dOfg4KDgL9LwCOl8HUZP5liSKtwRcJ_Ah4/edit?usp=sharing

Este trabalho apresenta estudos da historiografia da arte italiana recente sobre a pintora Artemisia Gentileschi (15931654), publicados no catálogo “Artemisia Gentileschi. Storia di una passione” referente à exposição Mostra Artemisia1, realizada no Palazzo Reale, em Milão, entre os anos de 2011 e 2012.

Resumo: "Artemisia Gentileschi e il suo tempo" intitula a exposição inaugurada pelo Museu de Roma em trinta de novembro de 2016, com encerramento previsto para sete de maio de 2017. O presente texto destaca as novas fontes documentais localizadas nos arquivos históricos italianos, algumas ainda não publicadas, durante a realização das pesquisas que motivaram a exposição. Tais documentos revelam questões importantes sobre a trajetória biográfica de Artemisia Gentileschi e sua obra e permitem repensar antigas hipóteses. As novas fontes, bem como as imagens produzidas a partir de raio-X das telas da pintora, têm possibilitado novas interpretações e novas relações, não apenas entre a vida e a obra de Artemisia Gentileschi, mas também entre a pintora e o seu tempo. Abstract: "Artemisia Gentileschi e il suo tempo" is the title of the exposition inaugurated by the Museum of Rome in November 30 th 2016 with its ending scheduled for May 7 th 2017. The following text highlights the new documental sources found in Italian historical archives, some of which still have not been published, during the researches that motivated the exposition. These documents reveal important issues about Artemisia Gentileschi's biographical trajectory and her work. They allow the rethinking of old hypotheses. The new sources, as well as the images produced from the x-rays of the paintings, have made new interpretations possible and enabled connections between not only Artemisia's life and work, but also between the painter and her time.

The apocryphal history of Judith and Holofernes has always attracted and fascinated artists and art lovers over the centuries. The reproduction, both of the beheading of Holofernes and of the moments before and after this act, are among the religious scenes most represented throughout the history of art (painting, sculpture, literature and music) surviving even and resisting until the twentieth century. Artists such as Palma Vecchio, Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Donatelo, Botticelli, Gustav Klimt and many others contributed to this episode, which is part of Western cultural imagery, as a recurrent theme of the historiography of art, crossing the centuries and being an essential part of the construction of their own identity and western culture.

The aim is to discover the bible story of Judith and Holofernes, and why the Baroque period, concreted by the Italian painter Michelangelo da Caravaggio and Artemisia Gentileschi was the liveliest period of the theme.

Initial research was based on the book, Artemisia Gentileschi: The Image of the Female Hero in Italian Baroque Art, written by Mary Garrard. Further research was expanded by reading primary sources, such as the Story of Judith in the books of the Christian Old Testament, and scholarly journal articles within the fields of the biblical Judith and Gentileschi’s life.

I also take as a reference and which is quite important, since it complements and emphasises the explanation of these works and are Wolfflin's "Fundamental Concepts of Art", which is a generalisation that explains the artistic works of Baroque Five points of view, that are: the linear and pictorial, surface and depth, closed form and open form, plurality and unity, clear and indistinct. These elements as I had already mentioned, are important because in a way, complement and end up being a more concrete way of analysing such works. And finally, a reflection on the image of Judith rather than on the symbolic context, a look at women as such since those times, and their connotation.

L'incontro, tenutosi il 15 maggio 2019 presso l'Aula Forti di via Zamboni 32 a Bologna, è nato dalla mia proposta "Una pittura 'di memoria, non di maniera': Artemisia Gentileschi e Lily Briscoe, Virginia Woolf e Anna Banti" sottoscritta da altri 9 studenti del Dipartimento di FICLIT e coordinata dal Prof. Marco Antonio Bazzocchi, poi approvata e finanziata sulla base della pertinenza con il progetto “Dipartimento di eccellenza" – MIUR (Legge 232 del 1/12/2016).
Il dibattito, coordinato dal Prof. Bazzocchi e dal Prof. Filippo Milani, ha visto gli interventi di Fausta Garavini e Laura Desideri (curatrici del Meridiano dedicato a Anna Banti, "Romanzi e Racconti"), ai quali è seguito anche un mio approfondimento sui possibili legami intertestuali tra "Artemisia" di Anna Banti e "To the Lighthouse" di Virginia Woolf.

Full text of essay developed from keynote address for Artemisia Gentileschi conference, Medici Archive Project, Florence 2015.  Issues addressed include Artemisia's creative originality, her competitive nature, and the difficulty of establishing a core oeuvre in the face of numerous implausible attributions to the artist.

Between roughly 1615 and 1622, Cristofano Bronzini
(1580–1633) wrote Della dignità et della nobiltà delle donne, a
defense of women that was partially published during his
lifetime with the patronage of Medici women. This article
brings to light the unpublished sections of Bronzini’s
manuscript containing descriptions of some thirty-three early
modern women artists, ranging from Properzia de’ Rossi to
the female court artists of the Ming Dynasty. At the focus
of this study is Bronzini’s profile of Artemisia Gentileschi,
offering a narrative account of the discovery of her artistic
talent at age twelve and detailing her earliest vocational
training in Rome up until the time of her marriage to
Pierantonio Stiattesi of Florence.
Artemisia’s profile in the Bronzini manuscript stands out
not only because it is the earliest biographical account ever
written about her, but also because it is rife with statements
that have no bearing upon the real facts of her life. It is
argued here that Artemisia herself supplied Bronzini with
this fictitious account and that she deliberately distorted the
facts of her youth in order to fashion herself according to
her own aspirations as well as her society’s morality codes,
its female stereotypes, and its mytho-heroic archetype of the
artist. In this account of Artemisia’s youth in Rome, the name
of Agostino Tassi and Artemisia’s relationship with him are
completely suppressed, while Artemisia’s own father, Orazio
Gentileschi, is portrayed in a negative light as her primary
antagonist. Moreover, the biography purports that Artemisia
taught herself to paint by studying Caravaggio’s canvases,
effectively asserting her place among the master’s earliest and
most devoted followers.

Artemisia Gentileschi's last documented and signed painting Susanna and the Elders at the Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna was previously attributed to the Bolognese painter Elisabetta Sirani. The article discusses the circumstances of the identification and attribution of the painting to its rightful author, in the context of Gentileschi's other works of this biblical subject, and proposes a possible patron.

This paper takes a formalist look at Artemisia Gentileschi's 1611-1612 Judith Slaying Holofernes, in opposition to mainstream scholarship, which largely focuses on Artemisia's biography. Artemisia engages a tradition of phallic imagery art history that has been shaped by a belief in both the supremacy of the penis in terms of biology and bodily function (" physical supremacy ") as well as the supremacy of the penis in structuring knowledge and meaning (" experiential supremacy ") also known as phallogocentrism. Such a tradition is predicated upon a belief that the penis is " active, " while female genitalia are " passive. " With this belief, a Freudian psychoanalytic reading of the original Book of Judith, Caravaggio's rendition of the same scene, and Artemisia's painting all uphold a penile economy of power and highlight " castration anxiety, " the fear of losing the cherished penis. However, in line with Irigaraiyan psychoanalysis, Artemesia herself believes female genitalia to be " active, " and the penis to be " passive, " creating a female genitalia-centered economy of power. As a result, Artemisia inserts femininity into her composition in ways that, in their very formal employment, indicate and