averilburystedmunds: Artemisia Gentileschi: Rome 1593-Naples 1652/3

La Pittura.
Self portrait as the Allegory of Painting.
Currently exhibited in Windsor Castle

Judith beheading Holofernes 1612-13

Agostino Tassi

Artemisia Gentileschi was the daughter of Orazio Gentileschi, a famous painter and major follower of the revolutionary Baroque painter, Caravaggio and she, too, became a proponent of Caravaggio’s dramatic realism. As a young woman, she was a pupil of both her father and of Agostini Tassi, his friend and a well-known landscape painter; originally she copied her father’s interpretation of Caravaggio’s example, but gradually developed her own distinctive style. Her first recorded painting was of Susannah and the Elders, 1610, an accomplished and mature work, long believed to be by her father. She also attempted two versions of a subject, painted by the master, of Judith Beheading Holofernes 1612/13; 1620.

In 1612 she was raped by Tassi and their relationship continued briefly with Artemisia believing that Tassi intended marriage. When it became obvious that he did not, her father, Orazio, brought him to trial which proved an intense experience for her, tortured, as she was, to ‘prove’ her accusation. Tassi was found guilty eventually but appears to have served little time in prison. Meanwhile, father Orazio quickly arranged a marriage for his daughter to a Florentine, Pierantonio Stiatesi, a minor artist, and she moved to Florence, joining the Florentine Academy of Design in 1616 and further developing her style in history painting, an unfashionable subject for a woman artist of her time; still life and portraiture were generally considered more appropriate for 17^th century women artists. She became associated with the Medici court and also painted an Allegory of Inclination, c 1616, for the series of frescoes honouring the life of Michelangelo in the Casa Buonarotti. She continued to use more brilliant colours than her father and to make full use of the art of the juxtaposition of light and dark as exemplified by chiaroscuro.

Self portrait as a Lute Player

Artemisia painted in Rome and Venice for a while, moving to Naples in 1630 before settling for several years in London with her father, to work together for King Charles 1. They collaborated on the ceiling paintings of the Great Hall in the Queen’s House and she was awarded several commissions from a number of aristocratic and royal patrons, quickly surpassing her father’s fame at a time when few women artists were recognised. Later she returned to Naples, around 1640/1, painting several versions of the story of David and Bathsheba but gradually slipping from view. Little is known of her later life. Her work fell out of favour in the 18^th and 19^th centuries but during the last fifty to a hundred years, she has become highly rated for her powerful and empathic depictions of women from history. In fact, her artistic vocation was only really rediscovered in the early 1900s by the Caravaggio scholar, Roberto Longhi.

Susannah and the Elders.

This Artemisia blog has been initiated by the very recent rediscovery of a rare surviving painting of hers, in the Royal Collection, after being misattributed two centuries ago. It is her first major work, Susannah and the Elders, and conservators hope that its discovery will add fresh light to her creative processes as well as adding weight to the collection of her paintings as the greatest female artist of her generation. Art historian, Dr. Niko Munz, decided to try to track down paintings from the extensive art collection of King Charles 1 which had been sold off and scattered after his execution in 1646. Seven paintings by Artemisia had been recorded in the King’s collection but only the Self-Portrait was thought to have survived, although this Susannah painting may possibly have been purchased by Queen Henrietta Maria, the wife of King Charles. However, during this recent search, curators were able to match the description of Susannah and the Elders, to a painting in store for 100 years at Hampton Court Palace, in poor condition and attributed to ‘the French School’. Conservation work discovered a ‘CR’ on the reverse of the painting, confirming that it had been in the collection of the King. [‘Carolus Rex’] Conservation also involved the painstaking removal of centuries of surface dirt, discoloured varnish, and clumsy early attempts at renovation and ‘improvement’. Canvas strips added to enlarge the original painting, were removed; the canvas was re-lined and re-framed and the newly-restored painting is now on display for three weeks, in the Queen’s Drawing Room at Windsor Castle with another of Artemisia’s oeuvre, Self-Portrait as the Allegory of Painting, [La Pittura], considered one of her greatest works, together with Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife by Orazio, her father, painted during his London period.