Artemisia Gentileschi, Masterful Baroque Painter
(Oh, Yes, She Was Also a Woman)

[Regions of Italy]

Often, even the best artists go to their graves with only a hope of ever becoming famous. Artemisia Gentileschi achieved notoriety long before her death, but it took almost three centuries for her to garner the genuine respect she deserved as one of the Baroque era's finest painters. Today we can form our own opinion of her abilities and sensitivities, because her works are on public display in many parts of Italy. One thing of which we can be almost certain: if you like Caravaggio you will like Artemisia. Similarly, if Caravaggio makes you uneasy, Artemisia is liable to really make you squirm.

Self-Portrait

Our heroine - yes, she is one of our heroines - was born in Rome in 1593. She began her studies with her father, who was an established local painter. As a female, it was the only avenue open to her, because women were not allowed to draw from live nude males. They were also barred from membership in any academies. This effectively doomed them to secondary status; in order to practice their art at all, most of them compromised by painting portraits and still life.

Artemisia never accepted those constraints. Her chosen subjects were biblical and mythological, with a special interest for those in which the active character was a woman. Throughout her life, she strove to thwart the romanticized vision of the frail female, the subtle seductress, the helpless victim, the impossibly perfect beauty, the expressionless maternal vessel - all roles that had commonly been accepted and championed by artists for centuries. Artemisia's protagonists acted on their emotions. If their deeds were sometimes bloody and cruel, their depictor made no apologies for them.

Artemisia, by Jérome David

Artemisia's ferocity was understandable. Not only had she been automatically relegated to a position far beneath her considerable talents, but when she was just 19 she underwent an extraordinary event: her father brought suit against his close friend, the artist Agostino Tassi, for the rape of his daughter. The trial that ensued lasted seven months, during which time Artemisia was forced to publically describe the harassment she had suffered at the hands of Tassi and other men. The humiliation was to last for decades. But rather than let this episode destroy her, she used it to fuel her talents and ignite the larger than life scenes she chose to paint.

Many of Artemisia's heroines are positively bloodthirsty. There's Judith, an Israelite widow who saved her people by tricking and beheading the Assyrian general Holofernes. When the great Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio painted this scene in 1599, he focused on the expression of surprise in the dying man's face. Judith, he portrayed as a virginal, unruffled, almost motionless young woman. Fourteen years later, Artemisia gives us a generously proportioned vixen, somewhat reminiscent of Cervantes' Dulcinea, who saws away at the villain's throat causing crimson clots of blood to destroy the silken sheets. In an earlier canvas, the same heroine is seen a few minutes after the dastardly deed, proudly holding aloft her dagger, wearing a cameo emblazoned with an armed warrior. Blood oozes through the braids of the wicker basket in which her maidservant holds the tyrant's severed head. In these as in all of Artemisia's paintings, the use of chiaroscuro is breathtaking, adding dimensions, emotions and fluidity to the compositions.

by Kristin Jarratt

Several biographies and a novel about Artemisia are available by clicking here.

Click on the pictures to see them enlarged.

	Woman Playing a Lute
	Judith Slaying Holofernes
	Judith and Her Maidservant
	The Penitent Magdalen
	Self-Portrait as the Allegory of Painting

	Susanna and The Elders
	Jael and Sisera
	Portrait of a Gonfaloniere
	Lucretia
	Esther Before Ahasuerus

Some of Artemisia Gentileschi's works can be seen at:

Rome: Spada Gallery (Madonna and Child, 1609; Woman Playing a Lute, 1612)

Pommersfelden, Germany: Schloss Weissenstein (Susanna and The Elders, 1610)

Naples: Capodimonte Museum (Judith Slaying Holofernes, 1613; The Annunciation, 1630)

Florence: Pitti Palace (Judith and Her Maidservant, 1614; The Penitent Magdalen, 1620); Uffizi (St. Catherine, 1615; Judith Slaying Holofernes, 1620); Casa Buonarroti (Allegory of Inclination, 1616)

Budapest: Szépmüvészeti Museum (Jael and Sisera, 1620)

Bologna: Palazzo D'Accursio (Portrait of a Gonfaloniere, 1622)

Genoa: Palazzo Cattaneo-Adorno (Lucretia, 1621)

New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art (Esther Before Ahasuerus, 1623)

Detroit: The Detroit Institute of the Arts (Judith and Her Maidservant with the Head of Holofernes, 1625)

Madrid: Prado (Birth of St. John the Baptist, 1633)

Toledo, Ohio: Toledo Museum of Art (Lot and His Daughters, 1640s)

Columbus, Ohio: Museum of Art (David and Bathsheba, 1640s)

London: Royal Collection, St. James Palace (Self-Portrait as the Allegory of Painting, 1630; Esther Before Ahasuerus, 1622-23)

[Regions of Italy]