In this and many other ways, Artemisia’s Lucretia will open a window for our visitors onto important issues of injustice, prejudice, and abuse that lie below the beguilingly beautiful surfaces of such works.”Īccording to the History of Rome (Book I, 57-59) by ancient Roman historian Livy, the legendary Lucretia was the virtuous wife of the nobleman Lucius Tarquinius Collatinus. Her achievement as a painter of powerful and dramatic history subjects is all the more remarkable for the abuse and prejudice that she suffered in her personal life-and which is palpably present in Lucretia’s suicide, and other of her paintings where the central protagonist is a wronged or abused woman. “A thorough reassessment of her place in baroque art had to wait until the late-20th century, since then she has become one of the most sought-after painters of the 17th century. “Although renowned in her day as a painter of outstanding ability, Artemisia suffered from the long shadow cast by her more famous and celebrated father Orazio Gentileschi (of whom the Getty has two major works, Lot and His Daughters and the recently acquired Danaë and the Shower of Gold),” said Timothy Potts, Maria Hummer-Tuttle and Robert Tuttle Director of the J. The subject, which Gentileschi painted several times over the course of her career, no doubt had very personal significance for her: like Lucretia, the Roman heroine who took her own life after having been raped, Artemisia experienced sexual violence as a young woman. Recently rediscovered after having been in private collections for centuries, the painting represents the artist at the height of her expressive powers and demonstrates her ambition for depicting historical subjects, something that was virtually unprecedented for a female artist in her day. Paul Getty Museum has acquired a major work by Artemisia Gentileschi, the most celebrated woman painter of 17th-century Italy. Warning: This story contains descriptions of suicide and sexual violenceĮmerging from the shadows, eyes cast heavenward, her head tilted back, breasts bare, Lucretia contemplates the unthinkable: whether to take the dagger she grasps in her hand and plunge it into her chest. Lucretia, about 1627, Artemisia Gentileschi.
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