women in art, part seven: baroque painter artemisia gentileschi - art in light and dark

briefly

Baroque art is one of the most compelling periods of Western art. Highlighted by the dramatic juxtasposition of light and dark (chiaroscuro), spatial grandness and marks of realism - particularly in detailing textures of skin and cloth - the paintings of the period are some of the most vividly intense and dramatic images fans of art can feast on. And if soulful passion was what drove the artists then to their canvases, Artemisia Gentileschi was no exception.

Artimisia Gentileschi is greatly known for her originality and powerful narrative. Original because she reinvented the use of chiaroscuro by Carravagio, the leading figure of baroque, and powerful because her work was mostly influenced by her personal travails. Her most famous composition, Judith Beheading Holofernes (see below), is thought to be a reaction to the sexual abuse (for which she was physically probed, ridiculed as a woman of ill repute and underwent a painful 7-month trial) she suffered in the hands of her father's associate, the fresco artist Agostino Tassi in 1612. In fact, the 1620 painting is only one of several creations that depicted the same biblical story of the virtuous widow Judith who seduced and murdered the Assyrian general Holofernes using his own sword. And throughout her career, Gentileschi always portrayed women as decisive, resolute and strong figures. Another great artist ahead of her time.

timeline

• 1593 - Artemisia Gentileschi was born on July 8 in Rome to noted Tuscan painter Orazio Gentileschi

• 1605 - Gentileschi's mother died

• 1610 - Gentileschi painted Susannah and the Elders (see below) at the age of 17

• 1612 - Gentileschi was denied membership to all-male art academies

• 1612 - Gentileschi accused Florentine artist Agostino Tassi, her father's associate, of rape

• 1612 - Gentileschi married Pietro Antonio di Vincenzo Stiattesi and they moved to Florence

• 1616 - Genteleschi was the first woman to be accepted into the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno (Academy of Design)

• 1621 - Gentileschi returned to Rome

• 1638 - Gentileschi joined her father at the court of Charles I of England in London

• 1639 - Gentileschi's father died, leaving several commissions for her to fulfill

• 1641 - Gentileschi returned to Italy in Naples at the onset of the civil war in England

• 1656 - It is speculated that Gentileschi died of the plague that killed many in Naples

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quotes

"As long as I live I will have control over my being."

"My illustrious lordship, I'll show you what a woman can do. "

"(Artemisia Gentileschi was) the only woman in Italy who ever knew about painting, coloring, doughing and other fundamentals".

• Italian critic Robert Longhi on Gentileschi (1916)

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