Had they lived in these days, women artists would have been said to be victims of ‘cancellation’. But since they didn’t, they were simply erased from history and the injustice of which they were victims was not even mentioned. Now the Thyssen Bornemisza Museum in Madrid rescues them from oblivion in the Maestras exhibition, open until February 4.
The curious thing is that most of them were famous in their time. But then a draft of sorts passed that removed their names from male-dominated art history.
Artemisia Gentileschi, Angelica Kauffmann, Clara Peeters, Rosa Bonheur, Mary Cassatt, Berthe Morisot, María Blanchard, Natalia Goncharova, Sonia Delaunay and Maruja Mallo were some of them. Her works were challenging, full of meaning and of excellent quality. Today, after years of oblivion, they are once again recognized as teachers.
The exhibition includes nearly a hundred pieces of the most varied styles: paintings, sculptures, works on paper and textiles. And it covers from the 16th century to the 20th century, in eight sections that its curator, Rocío de la Villa, has demarcated.
It also shines a light on the patrons and gallery owners (many of them also women) who supported them. And it highlights the position that these teachers adopted regarding controversial issues of their time.
The meticulously curated exhibition weaves a fascinating narrative spanning centuries of artistic creation, highlighting the technical mastery and emotional depth imprinted in the works of these visionaries.
It is not only a tribute to the technical skill, but also to the bravery and audacity of these women who defied the social norms and obstacles imposed by their time to capture their unique vision of the world on canvas. The diversity of styles and approaches demonstrates the inexhaustible wealth of female creativity and its crucial role in the evolution of art.
Sorority I
This large section addresses what the museum calls La Causa Delle Donne: women’s causes. XVII century. Italy. Counter Reformation. The painting showed heroines from mythology, degrades in erotic paintings and deformed stories. Artists such as Lavinia Fontana and Fede Galizia, Artemisia Gentileschi and Elisabetta Sirani, among others, showed opposite creations with chaste and brave heroines.
After the scientific revolution and colonialism, human beings distance themselves from nature. Then, the rise of still lifes and botanical drawings took place. Female patrons supported female artists, when they were branded as “witches” simply for associating with plants. Not men, of course. The esteem for them differed and was admiration.
Fede Galizia and Giovanna Garzoni, in Italy, and the sisters Rachel and Anna Ruysch, in Holland, are some of them. They used instruments such as telescopes and studied ecosystems that were later reflected in their works: habitats of flies, butterflies and other insects. Patron Agnes Block in her garden at Vijverhof, near Amsterdam, embraced botanical artists, such as Maria Moninckx, Maria Sibylla Merian and her daughter Johanna Helena Herolt.
During the Enlightenment, women played an active role, perhaps the first, as citizens. In France they supported them by recognizing them as academics.
The paintings appear cultured women searching for their identity in settings such as archaeological ruins. These are artists such as Élisabeth Vigée-Le Brun, Adélaïde Labille-Guiard, Angelica Kauffmann, and sculptors such as Marie-Anne Collot and Anne Seymour Damer. They reaffirm the identity of the subject and the individuality in the portrait and pave the way for Modernity.
In the African colonial era, women artists became interested in non-Western people. They traveled and observed. They moved away from the sexualized image offered by other artists.
Spanish culture enchanted North Africa, where it was considered exotic. The shepherds, gypsies and peasants of Spanish customs arrived in Paris, led by artists like Rosa Bonheur.
Perhaps one of the most interesting segments of the exhibition is the one that deals with work and care. Far from the solitary woman who irons and is reflected in men’s works, the artists highlight those who work in the countryside or in the city. The names that stand out are, among others, Alice Havers, Eloísa Garnelo and Marie Petiet.
They show women as housewives, as caregivers of the sick, as fishermen and even as shoppers in stores. Not all of them ironed; At least not all the time. Victoria Malinowska and Elizabeth Sparhawk-Jones are some of the artists who remind us of this.
Of course, one of the most important aspects for women had to play a role in this exhibition: motherhood. In the 19th century, patriarchy tried to impose the supreme value of the image of women as caretakers of the home, to stop the speed of their emancipation. Many artists opposed this repression and fought with their innovative creations.
“Far from the solitary woman who irons and is reflected in men’s works, female artists highlight those who work in the countryside or in the city.”
They do not renounce their roles as mothers, but they do show the baby’s dependence and the difficult tasks that are added to parenting: housework, heavy care, emotional burden…
The painters Mary Cassatt, Elizabeth Nourse, Paula Modersohn-Becker, Tamara de Lempicka, Suzanne Valadon, the Finnish Helene Schjerfbeck and Elin Danielson-Gambogi, the Danish Anna Ancher and the Sevillian María Luisa Puiggener show the other side of the coin.
Sorority II
This other large section focuses on relationships between women. In their friendship, complicity and trust.
The impressionists Berthe Morisot, Marie Bracquemond, Louise Breslau and Cecilia Beaux and the sculptor Marie Cazin do so with a certain melancholy. And, in any case, within an atmosphere of intimacy in which men have no place.
In the 20th century, the female vote meant an enormous leap for women in democratic countries. This and other advances are reflected by avant-garde artists such as Helene Funke, Jacqueline Marval, Camille Claudel, Marie Laurencin, María Blanchard and Natalia Goncharova.
Sonia Delaunay and Alice Bailly, among others, use painting-weaving to teach their art as part of everyday life.
This exhibition, sponsored by Carolina Herrera, is the first within the feminist redefinition effort of the Thyssen Museum, one of the most important in Spain. A smaller sample can be seen at the Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck in Remagen, Germany.
With this display of talent, the Thyssen presents a vivid reminder of the need to recognize and celebrate the contribution of women to the art world. It is a call to review history with new eyes, to redefine established canons and to give these masters the place they deserve in the pantheon of artistic greatness. This is an act of historical justice.
JUANITA SAMPER OSPINA
EL TIEMPO correspondent
Madrid Spain
@SamperJuana
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2024-01-06 02:42:47
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