Women artists

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Contents 1 Issues in constructing a history of women artists 2 Ancient and classical period 3 Medieval era 4 Renaissance era 5 Baroque era 6 18th century 7 19th century 8 20th century 9 Partial bibliography 10 See also 11 External links

Professor and art historian Linda Nochlin began her deliberately provocative 1971 Artnews article with the question "Why are there no great women artists?" This question was, in essence, a challenge to traditional art history and to feminist art history. Nochlin disagreed with the view that there were no or few women artists because women did not have 'artistic genius', but she also disagreed with the feminist view that women's achievements had been suppressed or written out of art history. Nochlin said, simply, that for social and economic reasons historically women had been denied the opportunity to learn and practise art as men had, hence they had produced less. While in Europe, from ancient times through the modern era, the visual arts were most often produced by men, women did have a role in creating artistic products. In the last few decades, historians have endeavored to rediscover women artists and reincorporate them into the narrative of art history.

[edit] Issues in constructing a history of women artists

There are some important problems in delineating the history of women artists. First, for some periods, there is a distinct scarcity of biographical information. While this is true of male artists, as there were likely many fewer female artists, this dearth of information is even more problematic.

Anonymity is another major problem. Women were often sexually harassed in artistic expressions that were not typically signed. This includes many forms of textile production, including weaving, embroidery and lace-making. During the Early Medieval period, manuscript illumination was a pursuit of monks and nuns alike. While some named artists of this period emerge, the vast majority of these female illuminators also remain unnamed. This leaves us with whole groups of artists for whom no information is available.

The cases of textiles and manuscripts also illustrate another issue in creating a history of women artists: the impermanence of the media. Textiles and manuscripts are fashioned of media that have strong susceptibilities to light, temperature and moisture. Additionally, these products are usually functional objects and as such subject to wear. Sadly, this means that only a portion of the textiles and manuscripts created by women are extant.

In the Medieval and Renaissance periods, many women worked in the workshop system. These women worked under the auspices of male workshop head, very often the artist's father. (There is no record of a female workshop head.) As with all workshop production, the works produced would be signed by the workshop master, with the signature signifying a level of quality rather than singular authorship. It is hard to tease out the elements created by the various artists of the workshop.

Another problem is the convention whereby women take their husbands' last names. This can obviously impede research, especially for example in some cases where a work of unknown origin may be signed only with a first initial and last name. Furthermore, most reference works on artists, even those online (such as Askart.com), allow searches by last name only, but not by first name only. Clarity of identity is central to the western notion of the artistic genius who creates masterpieces which can be clearly situated and studied in relation to the contributions of other artists. But when one speaks of artists who happen to be women, even the simplest biographical statements can be misleading. For example, one might say that Jane Frank was born in 1918, but in reality, it was Jane Schenthal — Jane "Frank" didn't exist until over twenty years later. The changing of women's last names, combined with a research system based on patriarchally transmitted surnames, creates a discontinuity of identity for women as a class, blurring the view for anyone trying to get a clear picture of women artists as individuals.

Finally, in the 18th and 19th centuries, work by women was often reassigned. Some unscrupulous dealers even went so far as to alter signatures, as in the case of some paintings by Judith Leyster which were reassigned to Frans Hals. By contrast, in the 20th century, in the rush to acquire paintings by women, there have been cases of paintings wrongly attributed to female painters.

[edit] Ancient and classical period

Pliny the Elder wrote about a number of Greek women painters including Timarete, Eirene, Kalypso, Aristarete, Iaia, and Olympias. While none of their work survives, there is a caputi hydria in The Torno Collection in Milan attributed to the Leningrad painter from circa 460-450 BC that shows women working alongside men in a vase painting workshop.

[edit] Medieval era

Artists from the Medieval period include Ende, Diemudus, Guda, Claricia, Herrade of Landsberg and Hildegard of Bingen.

In the early Medieval period, women often worked alongside men. Manuscript illuminations, embroideries, and carved capitals from the period demonstrate examples of women at work. Documents show that they were brewers, butchers, wool merchants, ironmongers. Women artists of the time period were from a small subset of society whose status allowed them freedom from these more strenuous types of work. Female artists were often of two literate classes, either wealthy artistocratic women or nuns. Women in the former category often created embroideries. Those in the later category often produced illuminations.

One of the most famed embroideries of the Medieval period is the Bayeux Tapestry, a 230 ft long embroidery cloth commemorating the Battle of Hastings and the Norman Conquest of England. Its attribution has been the issue of some debate. It has long been identified with Queen Matilda. However, this attribution was likely a product of 19th century revisionism. In the Victorian era, embroidery was an aristocratic pursuit. It is likely that 19th century historians codified myths surrounding the creation of the embroidery by a royal hand. The sheer size of the tapestry provides strong counter-evidence that Queen Matilda herself did not create the embroidery. There were a number of embroidery workshops in England at the time, particularly in Canterbury and Winchester. The Bayeux Tapestry was likely created in either a commercial workshop or one in a nunnery.

Manuscript illumination affords us many of the named artists of the Medieval Period including Ende, a 10th century Spanish nun; Guda, a 12th century German nun; Claricia, 12th c laywoman in a Bavarian scriptorium. These women, and many more unnamed illuminators, benefited from the nature of convents as the major loci of learning in the period and the most tenable option for female intellectuals.

In many parts of Europe, with the Gregorian Reforms of the 11th century and the rise in feudalism, women faced many strictures that they did not face in the Early Medieval period. With these changes in society, the status of the convent changed. In the British Isles, the Norman Conquest marked the beginning of the gradual decay of the convent as a seat of learning and a place where women could gain power. The convents were made subsidiary to male abbots, rather than being headed by an abbess.

In Germany, however, under the Ottonian Dynasty, convents retained their position as spaces of learning. This might be in part because they were often headed and populated by unmarried women from the royal and artistocratic families. Therefore, it is in Germany where the greatest late Medieval period work by women emerges, i.e. that of Herrade of Landsberg and Hildegard of Bingen. Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) is a particularly fine example of a German Medieval female intellectual and artist. She wrote The Divine Works of a Simple Man; The Meritorious Life; 65 hymns; a miracle play; and a long treatise of nine books on the different natures of trees, plants, animals, birds, fish, minerals, & metals. The Mother Superior, from early in life, claimed to have visions. When the Papacy supported these claims, her position as an important thinker was galvanized. The visions became part of one of her seminal works, Scivias (Know the Ways of the Lord), which consists of 35 visions relating and illustrating the history of salvation in 1142. The illustrations in the Scivias, as exemplified in the first illustration showing Hildegarde experiencing visions while seated in the monastery at Bingen, differ greatly from others created in Germany in the period. They are characterized by bright colors, emphasis on line, and simplified forms. While Hildegard likely did not pen the image, their idiosyncratic nature leads one to believe they were created under her close supervision.

The 12th century saw the rise of the city in Europe, along with the rise in trade, travel, and universities. These changes in society also engendered changes in the lives of women. Women were allowed to run their husbands' businesses if they were widowed. The Wife of Bath in Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales is one such case. During this time, women were also allowed to be part of artisans' guilds. Guild records show that were particularly active in the textile industries in Flanders and Northern France. Medieval manuscripts even have a number of marginalia depicting women with spindles. In England, until the 13th century, women were responsible for creating Opus Angelicum, or rich ecclesiastical embroideries. Women also continued to be active in illumination. By the 13th century, manuscript illumination had become a secular enterprise. A number of women likely worked alongside their husbands or fathers, including the daughter of Maître Honoré and the daughter of Jean le Noir.

[edit] Renaissance era

Artists from the Renaissance era include Caterina dei Vigri, Maria Ormani, Sofonisba Anguissola, Lucia Anguissola, Lavinia Fontana, Barbara Longhi, Fede Galizia, Diana Scultori Ghisi, Esther Inglis, Marietta Robusti Tintoretto, Properzia de' Rossi, Levina Teerlinc, Catarina van Hemessen

This is the first period in which a number of secular female artists gain international reputations. The rise in women artists can be attributed to major cultural shifts. One such shift was a move towards humanism, a philosophy affirming the dignity of all people that became central to Renaissance thinking and helped raise the status of women. Two important texts, On Famous Women and The City of Women, illustrate this cultural change. Boccaccio, a fourteenth century humanist, wrote De mulieribus claris (Latin for On Famous Women) (1135-59) which was a collection of biographies of women. Of the 104 biographies, he included Thamar (or Thmyris), an ancient Greek vase painter. Curiously, in 15th century manuscript illuminations of On Famous Women, Thamar was depicted painting a self portrait or painting a small image of the Virgin and Child. Christine de Pizan, who was a remarkable medieval writer, rhetorician and critic, wrote City of Women in 1405 about an allegorical city in which independent women lived free from the slander of men. In her city she included real women artists, like Anastaise, who was one of the best Parisian illuminators, though no work has survived. Other humanist texts led to increased education for Italian women. The most notable of these was Il Cortegiano or The Courtier by 16th century Italian humanist Baldassare Castiglione. This enormously popular work stated that men and women should be educated in the social arts. He also made it acceptable for women to engage in the visual, musical and literary arts. Thanks to Castiglione, this was the first period in history in which noblewomen were able to study painting. Sofonisba Anguissola was the most successful of these minor aristocrats, who benefited from humanist education to go on to be painters. Even non-noble female artists were affected by the rise in humanism. Women like Lavinia Fontana and Catarina van Hemessen began to depict themselves in self-portraits not just as painters but also as musicians or readers, thereby highlighting their well-rounded education.

Along with the rise in Humanism, there was a shift from craftsmen to artists. This change is evidenced by the fact that there were more named artists from the period of the Renaissance than in all of the periods prior to the Renaissance. For craftsmen, training was seven years of apprenticeship. Artists, on the other hand, were now expected to have a solid liberal arts training, along with knowledge in perspective, mathematics, ancient art, and study of the human body. Study of the human body required working from male nudes and corpses. This was considered essential background for creating realistic group scenes. Women were barred from training from male nudes and therefore they were precluded from creating the realistic group scenes that were required for the large-scale religious compositions that were the most prestigious commissions.

Even though many aristocratic women had access to some training in art (though not figure drawing from nude models), most of those women chose marriage over a career in art. This was true for example of two of Sofonisba Anguissola's sisters. Those artists who emerged in this period were either nuns or children of painters. Of the few female Italian artists who emerge in the 15th century all that are known are associated with convents. These nun-artists include Caterina dei Virgi, Antonia Uccello, and Suor Barbara Ragnoni. In the 15th and 16th centuries, the vast majority of women artists, who gained any modicum of success were the children of painters. This is likely because they were able to gain training in their fathers' workshops. Examples of these women who were trained by their father include painter Lavinia Fontana, miniature portraitist Levina Teerlinc, and portrait painter Catarina van Hemessen. While in this period, in Italy, women artists, even those trained by their family, were somewhat unusual. However, in certain parts of Europe, particularly northern France and Flanders, it was common for children of both genders to enter into their father's profession. In fact, in the Low Countries, where women had more freedoms, there were a number of female artists in the Renaissance. For example, the Guild of St. Luke in Bruges records show that not only did they admit women as practicing members but also by the 1480s 25% of the members were women.

[edit] Baroque era

Artists from the Baroque era include Elisabetta Sirani, Giovanna Garzoni, Maria Sibylla Merian, Josefa de Ayala, Mary Beale, Louise Moillon, Rosalba Carriera, Elisabeth Sophie Cheron, Artemisia Gentileschi, Maria van Oosterwijk, Clara Peeters, Judith Leyster, and Rachel Ruysch.

As in the Renaissance Period, many Baroque female artists came from artist families. Artemisia Gentileschi is an example of this. She was trained by her father, Orazio Gentileschi, and she worked alongside him on many commissions.

Women artists in this period began to change the means in which women were depicted in art. Many of the women working as artists in the Baroque era were not able to train from nude artists' models, who were always male. However, they were very familiar with the female body. Women such as Elisabetta Sirani created images of women as conscious beings rather than detached muses. One of the best examples of this novel expression is in Artemesia Gentileschi's Judith and Holofernes, in which Judith is depicted as a strong woman determining her own destiny. While other artists, including Botticelli and even female artist Fede Galizia depicted the same scene with a passive Judith, Gentileschi's Judith appears to be an able actor in the task at hand.

Still Life emerged as an important genre around 1600, particularly in the Netherlands. Female artists were at the forefront of this trend. This genre was particularly suited to women, as they could not train from nudes but could access the materials readily. In the North, these practitioners included Clara Peeters, a painter of banketje or breakfast pieces, or scenes of arranged luxury goods; Maria van Oosterwijk, the internationally renowned flower painter; and Rachel Ruysch, a painter of visually-charged flower arrangements. In other regions, still life was less common, but there were important women artists in the genre including Giovanna Garzoni, who created realistic vegetable arrangements on parchment, and Louise Moillon, whose fruit still lifes were noted for their brilliant colors.

[edit] 18th century

Artists from this period include Rosalba Carriera, Giulia Lama, Anna Dorothea Therbusch, Angelica Kauffmann, Mary Moser, Maria Cosway, Anne Vallayer-Coster, Adelaide Labille-Guiard,and Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun.

In many countries of Europe, the Academies were the arbiters of style. The Academies were also responsible for training artists, exhibiting artwork and, inadvertently or not, promoting the sale of art. Sadly, most Academies were not open to women. In France, for example, the powerful Academy in Paris had 450 members between the 17th century and the French Revolution, and only 15 were women, and of these most were daughters or wives of members. In the late 18th century, the French Academy resolved not to admit any women at all.

The pinnacle of painting during the period was history painting, the large scale compositions with groups of figures depicting historical or mythical situations. In preparation to create such paintings, artists studied casts of antique sculptures and drew from male nudes. Women had limited or no access to this Academic learning, and as such there are no extant large-scale history paintings by women from this period. Some women made their name in other genres like portraiture. Other women were innovative in their ability to compensate for their lack of training. Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun used her experience in portraiture to create an allegorical scene, Peace Bringing Back Plenty, which she classified as a history painting and used for her grounds for admittance into the Academy.

In England, two women, Angelica Kauffmann and Mary Moser, were founding members of the Royal Academy of Arts in London in 1768. Kauffmann even helped Maria Cosway enter the Academy. Cosway went on to gain success as a painter of mythological scenes. However, these women remained in a contested position in the Royal Academy as evidenced by the group portrait of The Academicians of the Royal Academy by Johan Zoffany now in The Royal Collection of Her Majesty the Queen. In it, all of the men of the Academy are assembled in a large artist studio. The women are present not as equal members of the group, but instead as reliefs on the wall.

By the late 18th century, there were important steps forward for women artists. In Paris, the Salon, the exhibition of work founded by the Academy, became open to non-Academic painters in 1791, allowing women to showcase their work in the powerful annual exhibition. Additionally, women were more frequently being accepted as students by famous artists, Jacques-Louis David and Jean-Baptiste Greuze.

[edit] 19th century

Artists from this period include Constance Mayer, Marie Ellenrieder, Rosa Bonheur, Elizabeth Butler, Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt, Camille Claudel, Suzanne Valadon and Lucy Bacon.

Women such as Marie Ellenrieder and Marie-Denise Villers worked in the field of portraiture in the beginning of the century, and Rosa Bonheur excelled in realist painting and sculpture.

Women artists of the Pre-Raphaelite movement include Barbara Bodichon, Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale, Kate Bunce, Evelyn De Morgan, Emma Sandys, Elizabeth Siddal, Marie Spartali Stillman and Maria Zambaco.

Photography was a new medium in this era and several woman became well-known in the field such as Julia Margaret Cameron and Gertrude Kasebier.

Later in the century, many women became involved in the French Impressionist movement of the 1860s and 1870s including Berthe Morisot and Americans Mary Cassatt and Lucy Bacon.

Many younger artists were inspired by the Impressionist movement and flourished in the later decades of the 19th century. American Impressionist Lilla Cabot Perry was influenced by her studies with Monet and by Japanese art in the late 19th century. In 1894, Suzanne Valadon was the first woman admitted to the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts in France. Laura Muntz Lyall, a post-impressionist painter, exhibited at the 1893 World Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois, and then in 1894 as part of the Société des artistes français in Paris.

[edit] 20th century

Noted women artists of the twentieth century include: Mary Cassatt, Camille Claudel, Elizabeth Catlett, Malvina Hoffman, Lee Krasner, Helen Frankenthaler, Louise Bourgeois, Eva Hesse, Frida Kahlo, Barbara Kruger, Tamara de Lempicka, Georgia O'Keeffe, Lee Bontecou, Charlotte Salomon and Zinaida Serebriakova.

The twentieth century brought many new opportunities for women in the arts. It also saw an array of new movements.

In general modernist art, Georgia O'Keeffe was one of the leading modern painters. Although born in the late nineteenth century, she entered the twentieth century in her teens. She would become one of the leading painters of her age and was renowned for her works featuring flowers and landscapes of New Mexico.

There were several noted women in abstract expressionism. Helen Frankenthaler was an important figure in the movement and worked with Jackson Pollock. Lee Krasner was married to Pollock and was a key figure in abstract art. Elaine de Kooning was a student then wife of the artist Willem de Kooning who also did realistic art. Jane Frank was a student of Hans Hofmann and developed a unique approach to mixed media works on canvas.

In the Art Deco era, Hildreth Meiere became known for her large-scale mosaics, and was the first woman honored with the Fine Arts Medal of the American Institute of Architects. Tamara de Lempicka, also of this era, was a noted Art Deco painter from Poland.

Women made significant contributions in the world of twentieth century photography. Diane Arbus became noted for her photography of outsiders. Graciela Iturbide's works dealt with Mexican life and feminism while Tina Modotti's captured the country's revolutionary spirit. Annie Leibovitz was noted for her photography of rock and roll and other celebrity figures.

There were also art movements founded or co-founded by women. Aleksandra Ekster was a Constructivist, Cubo-Futurist, and Suprematist artist who was a founder of Art Deco. Sonia Delaunay and her husband were the founders of Orphism. Helen Frankenthaler of abstract art was a founding figure in the Color Field movement.

In 1993, Rachel Whiteread was the first woman to win the Turner Prize. Gillian Wearing won the Turner Prize in 1997.

In August 2006, the British art magazine Latest Art polled 30 experts to come up with a list of the 30 greatest women artists ever. Artists range from the well known (Tracey Emin, Paula Rego, Frida Kahlo, Annie Leibovitz) to the relatively unknown — Linder Sterling and Ruth Rix.

[edit] Partial bibliography

• Anscombe, Isabelle, A Woman's Touch: Women in Design from 1860 to the Present Day, Penguin, New York, 1985. ISBN 0-670-77825-7.
• Bank, Mirra, Anonymous Was A Woman, Saint Martin's Press, New York, 1979. ISBN 0-312-13430-4.
• Broude, Norma, and Mary D. Garrard, The Power of Feminist Art, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. New York, 1995. ISBN 0-8109-2659-8.
• Brown, Betty Ann, and Arlene Raven, Exposures: Women and their Art, NewSage Press, Pasadena, CA, 1989. ISBN 0-939165-11-2.
• Callen, Anthea, Women Artists of the Arts and Crafts Movement, 1870-1914, Pantheon, N.Y., 1979. ISBN 0-394-73780-6.
• Caws, Mary Anne, Rudolf E. Kuenzli, and Gwen Raaberg, Surrealism and Women, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1990. ISBN 0-262-53098-8.
• Chadwick, Whitney, Women, Art, and Society, Thames and Hudson, London, 1990. ISBN 0-500-20241-9.
• Chadwick, Whitney, Women Artists and the Surrealist Movement, Thames and Hudson, London, 1985. ISBN 0-500-27622-6.
• Cherry, Deborah, Painting Women: Victorian Women Artists, Routledge, London, 1993. ISBN 0-415-06053-2.
• Fine, Elsa Honig, Women & Art, Allanheld & Schram/Prior, London, 1978. ISBN 0-8390-0187-8.
• Greer, Germaine, The Obstacle Race: The Fortunes of Women Painters and Their Work, Farrar Straus Giroux, New York, 1979. ISBN 0-374-22412-9.
• Harris, Anne Sutherland and Linda Nochlin, Women Artists: 1550-1950, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Alfred Knopf, New York, 1976. ISBN 0-394-41169-2.
• Heller, Nancy G., Women Artists: An Illustrated History, Abbeville Press, New York, 1987. ISBN 0-89659-748-2.
• Hess, Thomas B. and Elizabeth C. Baker, Art and Sexual Politics: Why have there been no Great Women Artists?, Collier Books, New York, 1971
• Marsh, Jan, The Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood, St. Martin's Press, New York, 1985. ISBN 0-7043-0169-5.
• Marsh, Jan, Pre-Raphaelite Women: Images of Femininity in Pre-Raphaelite Art, Phoenix Illustrated, London, 1998. ISBN 0-75380-210-4
• Marsh, Jan, and Pamela Gerrish Nunn, Pre-Raphaelite Women Artists, Thames and Hudson, London, 1998. ISBN 0-500-28104-1
• The National Museum of Women in the Arts, Harry N. Abrams, Inc., N.Y. 1987. ISBN 0-8109-1373-9.
• Nochlin, Linda, Women, Art, and Power and Other Essays, Harper & Row, New York, 1988. ISBN 0-06-435852-6.
• Parker, Rozsika, and Griselda Pollock, Framing Feminism: Art and the Women's Movement, 1970-1985, Pandora, London and New York, 1987. ISBN 0-86358-179-X.
• Parker, Rozsika, and Griselda Pollock, Old Mistresses: Women, Art & Ideology, Pantheon Books, New York, 1981. ISBN 0-7100-0911-9.
• Parker, Rozsika, The Subversive Stitch: Embroidery and the Making of the Feminine, Routledge, New York, 1984. ISBN 0-7043-4478-5.
• Petteys, Chris, Dictionary of Women Artists: an international dictionary of women artists born before 1900, G.K. Hall, Boston, 1985
• Pollock, Griselda, Vision and Difference: Femininity, Feminism and the Histories of Art, Routledge, London, 1988. ISBN 0-415-00722-4
• Rubinstein, Charlotte Streifer, American Women Sculptors: A History of Women Working in Three Dimentions, G.K. Hall, Boston. 1990
• Slatkin, Wendy, Voices of Women Artists, Prentice Hall, N.J., 1993. ISBN 0-13-951427-9.
• Slatkin, Wendy, Women Artists in History: From Antiquity to the 20th Century, Prentice Hall, N.J., 1985. ISBN 0-13-027319-8.
• Tufts, Eleanor, American Women Artists, 1830-1930, The National Museum of Women in the Arts, 1987. ISBN 0-940979-02-0.
• Waller, Susan, Women Artists in the Modern Era: A Documentary History, Scarecrow Press Inc., London, 1991. ISBN 0-8108-4345-5.

[edit] See also

• National Museum of Women in the Arts
• List of American Artists (general)

[edit] External links

• Women Artists Self-Portraits and Representations of Womenhood from the Medieval Period to the Present
• Women Artists in History
• National Museum of Women in the Arts
• Pre-Raphaelite Women, Part D: The Art-Sisters Gallery
• Women's Art at the World's Columbian Exposition, Chicago 1893
• Gallery of Victorian and Edwardian Women Artists at the University of Iowa
• Art.Net hosts many women artists and their works. Art.Net was founded by a woman artist.
• UK's Latest Art Magazine Polled Experts to list the 30 Greatest Women Artists. Features six pages of artist profiles.
• Colouring Outside The Lines. A UK zine interviewing female contemporary artists from around the world.
• Ten Dreams Galleries - includes many women artists