Women artists: Rachel Ruysch

Interesting workshop at the National Gallery looking at the life and work of the Dutch flower painted Rachel Ruysch and using her to discuss the history of female artists.

This was one in a series of workshop on women artists but I have only been able to get this one. It was led by Jacqui Ansell who is always good. The session began with an interesting look at why there are so few women artists represented in the National Gallery, whether this is just because there weren’t many or whether it is also because they have been forgotten by a male art historical world. We looked at the work since the 1970s to discuss this issue.

We then went on to look at Ruysch’s work, how it was received in her own lifetime and what enabled her to be an artist at that time. A 75,000 gilder lottery win allowed her a certain amount of freedom in her work as she could work without money worries and take time over her work. He work was commissioned by the Duke of Tuscany which is why it is represented in the Uffizi.

We spent some time in a delightful small room of Dutch flower pictures looking at examples of her work plus putting It in the context of the genre. I loved the luscious texture of her flowers and the wonderful detail of insects in amongst the flowers. We talked about whether these were real or imagined composition and how they show the hand of man as the flowers are hot house varieties not wild ones.

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