Ravenna, 1552 – Ravenna, 1638 Born from an accomplished painter and contemporary of the better-known Lavinia Fontana, Barbara took her first artistic steps in her father’s workshop. We know very little of her life: Vasari talks of her as you would for a child, though she was 14 years old at the time of his […]
Roma, 1595 – Mantova, 1651 If you’re passionate about baroque art, you might have heard of Domenico Fetti. Born in 1589, six years before his sister, he worked for the Gonzagas and Mantova’s churches are literally littered with his work, from the Cathedral’s apse to Sant’Orsola. He’s often described as a naturalist, influenced by both […]
Firenze, 1524 – Firenze, 1588 It is well known that one of the few ways you had to live as an artist in the XVI Century was by joining a nunnery. If you had the misfortune of being a woman, that is. Some painters had the luxury of founding their own version of a monastery, […]
Florence, 1541 – Unknown, 1594 Lucrezia was born in Florence from a foreign noble family who had come to Tuscany to enter the Medici’s court: her father was Alfonso Quistelli della Mirandola, a judge, and Giulia Santi, daughter from a long line of humanists and authors. Vasari mentions her as “accomplished in both painting and […]
Spilimbergo, 1538 – Venezia, 1559 Irene of Spilimbergo’s birth and death are both accounted for in her grandfather’s journal, and the latter is recorded as having happened after twenty-two days of fever and a splitting headache for having been too engaged in too much painting. Maybe the cause of her death was having such a […]
Bologna, 1490 – 1530 When Giorgio Vasari wrote about the Lives of contemporary artists, he included four women in its Part IV: Plautilla Nelli, Lucrezia Quistelli, Sofonisba Anguissola and Properzia de’ Rossi, the titular leader of the chapter including the others. Properzia isn’t as well known as Sofonisba, and why should she? She’s only the […]
Ascoli Piceno, 1600 – Roma, 1670 Considered the most prominent miniaturist of the Baroque Era, Giovanna Garzoni distinguishes herself for the production of still lives, parchments painted in a particular style called “a guazzo” and swift impressions in guache that almost seem to come out of another era. Her style alone would make her interesting […]
Marietta Robusti known as “the Tintoretta” Venice, approx. 1554 – Venice, 1590 Marietta Robusti had one problem in life: being born to a famous father. In an age where emerging as a female artist was almost as difficult as today, she would live her life under his shadow and eventually became known as “the Tintoretta”. […]
Ginevra Cantofoli Bologna, 1618 – Bologna, 1672 Ginevra died in 1672 aged 54 years, and that’s the only way we know she was born in 1618. News of her life are scarce, but she entered the orbit of the more famous paintress Elisabetta Sirani and from her diary we know Ginevra Cantofoli was a lady […]
What can you do when all you want to do is paint and you have the full support of your family but society would never accept it? The Caccia family knew the answer: you take the vows and found your own artistic school, disguising it as a monastery. Let’s take a dive into XV Century […]