![]() is a vibrant and energetic example – she portrays herself as a confident, smart professional, ready for work. She mainly painted genre and portrait works, and her self portrait at the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. A Dutch Golden Age artist, Leyster was one of only a few female painters who joined a guild in the seventeenth century. Similarly to Catharina van Hemessen, the career of Judith Leyster (1609–1660) slowed down after marriage. Judith Leyster (1609–1660) The National Gallery, London It was bequeathed to The National Gallery by Jacob Bell, Founder of the Pharmaceutical Society, in 1859 – the first time art by a woman was added to its permanent collection. The artwork represents both a celebrated female talent as well as an important queer story in art history. Rosa possibly painted The Horse Fair (a reduced version of a larger piece) with help from Nathalie – who assisted her partner with both artistic and household matters, freeing Rosa's time for her career. Rosa Bonheur, Nathalie Micas and Anna Klumpke are all buried together in France, under a tombstone that reads 'Friendship is divine affection'. Rosa met Nathalie when her father painted the younger woman's portrait, and the two became immediately close, soon deciding to spend their lives together. Her lifestyle wholeheartedly defied gender norms.Ĭigar-smoking, trouser-wearing and financially independent, Bonheur lived fairly openly in significant relationships with two other women during her lifetime: American painter Anna Klumpke (who had once owned a Rosa Bonheur doll), and prior to Anna, Nathalie Micas. Keen to study animal anatomy, Bonheur obtained a permit to wear men's clothing – more suited to slaughterhouses and working undisturbed in public. She was unruly at school but had an exceptional talent for drawing animals. Incredibly famous during the nineteenth century (there was even a porcelain doll made in her likeness), Rosa Bonheur (1822–1899) was the eldest child in a French family of artists. Rosa Bonheur (1822–1899) and Nathalie Micas (c.1824–1899) (possibly) The National Gallery, London The few and far between works by long-dead female artists do not come up for auction that often, hence the recent acquisition of Artemisia Gentileschi's Self Portrait. being cause for major celebration and discussion.ĭoes the purchase of the Gentileschi herald a new direction for The National Gallery's collecting policy? How did other women artists come to grace its walls and storage spaces, and what stories do these artworks tell? Its acquisitions policy aims to build upon existing strengths: Italian Renaissance, seventeenth-century Dutch and early modern French collections. Historically it has been – and arguably still is – difficult for a woman to be recognised as an artist, especially during the periods collected by The National Gallery. She was also a wife and mother, a status we have seen, from other art histories, that can often slow or kill an art practice. Why are the numbers so very low? Overall, the UK's entire public art collection is weighted toward male artists: one of the first public art collections to acquire work by a living female artist was Liverpool's Walker Art Gallery in 1871, with the purchase of a Sophie Anderson painting. This doesn't count a few extra: one pastel, one made jointly with at least one woman, some loans, and also art in the gallery’s intriguing History Collection (by Paula Rego, Vivien Blackett and Maggi Hambling). Oil paintings made by a female artist account for only around ten paintings in The National Gallery's permanent collection of 2,300, which equates to not even half a per cent. There's plenty of landscapes, still lifes, portraits of men and women – yet not so much art that is actually by women. ![]() Last year, over five million people flocked to the gallery to visit some of the world's most famous and recognisable masterpieces. Ah, The National Gallery – epitome of grandeur, treasure trove of western European painting – situated proudly in London's Trafalgar Square. ![]()
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