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Next Stop in Feminist History: Lavinia Fontana

Tue, 05/29/2012 - 08:15
Submitted by Carlin Ross

A few weeks ago Betty was telling me a story about her early art days in New York.  She used to head down to Cedars - a bar where artists like Jackson Pollock and Allen Ginsberg hung out - as one of the token female artists. 

They would ask Betty to name one famous female artist.  Her inability to name one proved their point that women would never gain prominence in the art world.

Well, meet Lavinia Fontana (1552-1614).  She was one of the leading painters in the 16th century who gained widespread recognition in Western Europe.  Famous for her portraits, Pope Paul V commissioned her as a court painter in 1604. 

The picture here is one of Lavinia's - Portrait of a Noblewoman.  The attention to detail is striking.  It's a wedding portrait and the dog symbolizes marital fidelity (some things never change - there's no dog in the groom's portrait). 

Just because we're not taught our own history doesn't mean we didn't crack that glass ceiling.      

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That's interesting

Tue, 05/29/2012 - 15:54
Jake E

There's a few of her self portraits here . She had 11 children!!! :) and was the main earner in her family while her husband kept house and painted some minor elements like curtains. She broke the glass ceiling because her father didn't have a son to continue the family business so he trained her. At least that's the view of history, but isn't that bit presumptuous 2nd or 3rd or 30th hand information seen through the historical filter of victorian England. In reality, then, the world wasn't a single place but many places that barely communicated . Few could read and nobody traveled out of their parish and power was hereditary. Then, depending on who inherited local power and that person was all powerful and individual, I think the world could be a very different place in all sorts of ways just 50 miles away.

Jake, Thank you for including

Tue, 05/29/2012 - 16:16
Carlin Ross

Jake,

Thank you for including all this information.  She sparked my interest but I didn't realize how amazing she really was...god damn it I love women.

Women and art

Thu, 05/31/2012 - 02:58
Patrick_R

Sadly, few women I'm aware of were allowed to train as artists during the Renaissance or most other periods. I would guess that any woman allowed to apprentice to become a painter back then must have had exceptional talent. As an amateur who has always been interested in art, I remember being aware of a woman artist or two by the time I was in high school. Mary Cassatt comes to mind. But there were far too few compared to the talent that never got to see the light of day.

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