Italy · 1593–c. 1656
Artemisia Gentileschi
Baroque painter of monumental biblical heroines, known for dramatic light and unflinching physicality.
- Subversive
- Monumental
- Self-Representation
Fun fact
She was the first woman admitted to Florence's Accademia delle Arti del Disegno, and she ran a workshop while negotiating her own commissions by letter.
How she made it
Oil on canvas built up in the Caravaggesque manner: a dark ground, figures lit by a single raking light source, and flesh modelled wet-into-wet so muscle and effort read as physical weight. She posed live models, often herself, and worked the drapery in thick, saturated glazes.
- Work
- Esther before Ahasuerus, 1620s
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Collection
- European Paintings, The Met