When President Jimmy Carter officially designated a Women’s History Week, the precursor to Women’s History Month, he cited the fact that “men and women have worked together to build this nation. Too often the women were unsung and sometimes their contributions went unnoticed.” This neglect of attribution has proven true throughout history and across varying fields. From Enheduanna, the first named author in history, to Ada Lovelace, the world’s first computer programmer, women have been contributing to advances in science and culture since the beginning of recorded time. Unfortunately, far fewer female innovators, scientists, or creators reach the level of renown to make them a household name like their male counterparts. The arts are no exception to this gendered gap in recognition.
Women have worked in the arts for centuries, but much of their work has gone unattributed or under-represented. Across cultures, ancient women heavily contributed to ceramic arts and fiber arts as part of the necessary work to keep a household clothed and fed. Women in many ancient societies, including China and Greece, painted as well. Medieval women, particularly those cloistered in convents, were able to make some contributions to religious art as well as embroidery and weaving. Victorian and Regency women of the middle and upper classes had access to some arts education, learning “fancy work” (painting and decorative arts) and “plain work” (sewing and practical arts); these were among the “accomplishments” referenced by authors like Charlotte Bronte and Jane Austen.
Despite their participation in the arts, it was an uphill battle for women to advance in the professional art fields, or for women’s contributions to be taken seriously when they did. Women were, throughout history, often barred from art institutions or the common practice of apprenticeship that allowed many of their male counterparts to receive a focused and in-depth education in the arts. Due to expectations of propriety and innocence, women were often forbidden from studying human anatomy or the nude figure. Exhibition opportunities and representation have also been limited throughout history. In 1989, a collective known as the Guerrila Girls put together a poster called Do women have to be naked to get into the Met. Museum? after surveying the artists and nudes in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s permanent collection and discovering that while 85% of the nudes were female, fewer than 5% of the represented artists were women.
Not all female artists have been forgotten or ignored throughout history, of course. Artists like Frida Kahlo and Georgia O’Keefe are household names, but many lesser-known artists fought incredible odds to pursue their dreams and make an impact on the world of art.
Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-early 1650’s)
Gentileschi was born in Rome to the painter Orazio Gentileschi, a follower of the style of Caravaggio. She was able to train under her father and his friend Agostino Tassi, a landscape painter. Her familial connection allowed her to bypass the usual barrier women faced in finding an apprenticeship. Unfortunately, Tassi was no simple benevolent tutor; he forced himself on her when she was only 17, promising to marry her when she threatened him with a knife and then working to destroy her reputation. Artemisia and her father took him to trial, where she had to undergo torture (ye olde lie detector test, I assume: citation here, but be warned that it contains graphic language and details from her testimony).
This early trauma did not hold her back. She surpassed her father in her use of color and the use of extreme contrast between light and dark popularized by Caravaggio. She married a Florentine man and in 1616 became the first woman to be admitted to Florence’s Academy of Design, where she developed her own style.
She was well-traveled in a time when travel was extremely difficult, living in Rome, Florence, and Naples and also briefly visiting Venice and London in her lifetime. After some troubles with creditors and debt that led her to escape to Rome in 1620, she eventually settled in Naples and ran a successful painting studio for more than two decades.
She did all of this with five children to raise!
Adelaide Labille-Guiard (1749-1803) and Marie-Gabrielle Capet (1761-1818)
The story of Labille-Guiard and Capet’s friendship and professional careers stands as a testament to what women can achieve when they support and help each other in a world that is hostile to their advancement.
Labille-Guiard began her career as a miniaturist, which was a more acceptable form of art for young women, but she joined the Académie de Saint-Luc, a Parisian guild for painters and sculptors that was a little more accessible to women. This allowed her to receive instruction from other artists and participate in exhibitions at the guild. She then learned from portraitist François-André Vincent, expanded her repertoire of art materials, and devoted herself to teaching young women artists. Her work was often featured at the Académie de Saint-Luc’s Salon exhibitions, which were so successful that the Académie Royale petitioned the King to shut them down in the late 1770’s. This didn’t keep Labille-Guiard down long; in 1783, she was one of the few women admitted to the prestigious Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, which capped its female admission to only four students at a time.
In between Labille-Guiard’s time at de Saint-Luc and the Académie Royale, she met Marie-Gabrielle Capet. Capet had modest origins and likely got her early training from a free public art school in Lyon. But in 1781, she came to Paris to learn under the tutelage of Labille-Guiard, which was the start of a lifelong friendship between the two women. They took turns modeling for each other, and Labille-Guiard was able to open doors for Capet for more prestigious commissions, which for both of them eventually included royalty. The two of them fought the sexism of their era, as well as the tendency of threatened male artists to spread rumors about sexual misconduct to sully their reputations, but both were able to maintain thriving careers. The two of them maintained a close friendship and working relationship, living together for most of Capet’s life even after Labille-Guiard’s marriage to the portraitist who taught her in her early career.
Labille-Guiard broke significant ground during her illustrious career, but she didn’t simply allow her success to be hers alone. Her famous Self-Portrait with Two Pupils, which features Capet, is a striking illustration of her devotion to uplifting other women in the arts. In 1795, she succeeded at a decades-long campaign to gain artist’s lodging at the Louvre where she could teach her students. She fought to remove the limits of female admission to the Académie, which largely resulted in snarky commentary about her being a “hen amongst roosters.”
Capet’s work didn’t receive the acclaim that Labille-Guiard enjoyed, but she was still able to maintain her career thanks to the support of her friend. At the end of Labille-Guiard’s life, Capet repaid the support by caring for her friend through her illness until her death. Afterwards, she painted The Atelier of Madame Vincent in honor of her teacher and friend, a large-scale historical rendering that celebrates the popularity, skill, and professionalism of her groundbreaking mentor.
Next week we'll look at two more lesser-known female artists who fought the odds to make history! If you want to experience the work of currently working and local women artists, join us at The Art Center this Saturday March 15 from 6-7:30 PM for the opening reception of "A Woman's Place is in the Arts."