Family Matters: Artists, Dynasties and Daughters

Excellent two part online course from the National Gallery looking at the role of families in artistic traditions and in particular the benefits for female artists.

Sian Walters led two two hour sessions over two days covering early female artists through to the 18th century. On the first day we looked at why women were only really able to operate as artists if they were part of an artistic family and some examples of this from the Renaissance including Marietta Robusti, Tintoretto’s daughter, Sofonisba Auguissola, Lavinia Fontana and Catharina Van Hemessen. We then went on to discuss Artemisia Gentileschi and her father and their influence on each other.

Day two we looked at some male dominated families mainly the Bellini’s and their brother in law Mantegna, concentrating on how Giovanni Bellini and  Mantegna influenced each other. We also looked at the Brueghel family and their family connections to later artists. We finished by looking at some later female artists, Judith Leyster, Rachel Rutsch and Elizabeth Louise Vigree le Brun.

All in all an interesting two days looking at art from a slightly different perspective.

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