Women Painters of the World: From the Time of Caterina Vigri, 1413-1463, to Rosa Bonheur and the Present Day — John Shaqi
Women Painters of the World: From the Time of Caterina Vigri, 1413-1463, to Rosa Bonheur and the Present Day
History
Women Painters of the World: From the Time of Caterina Vigri, 1413-1463, to Rosa Bonheur and the Present Day
Painting -- History; Women painters -- Biography
We pass on to a little bevy of emigrants, women painters who visited
foreign courts where they met with great successes. Sophonisba
Anguisciola, born of a noble family in Cremona, was enriched by Philip
II. of Spain; Artemesia Gentileschi came to London with her father and
found a patron in Charles I.; Maria La Caffa (17th century), a flower
painter, came upon her Mæcenas in the Court of Tyrol; it was in German
Courts that Isabella del Pozzo (17th century), like Felicita Sartori
(18th century), plucked bay leaves and laurels; and Violanta Beatrice
Siries, after making for herself a name in Paris, returned home to
Florence and painted many famous persons of the 18th century. Then we
have Rosalba Carriera, whose career ended in blindness and loss of
reason, and whose whole life is a touching story. As a child she made
Point of Venice lace; at the age of fourteen or fifteen she painted
snuff boxes with flowers and pretty faces; then miniatures of
well-known persons kept her brushes busy; but this minute art tried
her eyes so seriously that Rosalba adopted pastels instead, and soon
became the most famous pastellist of her period. She journeyed pretty
well all over the Continent, winning an extraordinary success wherever
she went, as well as a place in all the Academies of note, from the
Clementina at Bologna to the Royal Academy at Paris. Rosalba Carriera
arrived in Paris in April 1720; she kept a diary of her experiences,
and students of French history should read it in the edition annotated
by Alfred Sensier. But here we are concerned with the art alone of
Rosalba Carriera, an art rich in colour, swift and nervous in drawing,
full of character, and modelled always with vigour and with ease.
Returning now to an earlier traveller, Sophonisba Anguisciola, we meet
with another portraitist of real merit, more self-contained than
Rosalba, less impetuous, but fresh, witty, sincere and charming. It is
probable that she was born in 1533. After studying for some time at
Cremona, under Bernardino Campi, Sophonisba Anguisciola began to make
fun of the little girls of the period. Vasari set the greatest store
by one of these satirical sketches, representing a boy with a lobster
clawed to his finger, and a small girl laughing at his nimbleness. The
subject of another skit was an old woman studying the Alphabet, much
to the amusement of a baby girl.
[Illustration: SCHOOL OF CREMONA, XVI CENTURY
THREE SISTERS OF SOPHONISBA ANGUISCIOLA PLAYING AT CHESS. FROM A
PHOTOGRAPH BY HANFSTAENGL AFTER THE PAINTING IN THE RACZYNSKI
COLLECTION. VASARI SAW THIS PICTURE AND SAID THAT "THE FIGURES
WANTED ONLY VOICE TO BE ALIVE."
Sophonisba Anguisciola or Angussola, Painter
1533(?)-1626]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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