Art is the Solution

A few months ago, I wrote a blog post entitled “ Five Female Artists You Should Know .” I enjoyed writing the post, but it didn’t give me nearly enough space to talk about all the female artists I wanted to mention. So, today, I’m going to give you five more! The world of art is vast and varied. However, in almost every culture around the world, female artists have been undervalued or dismissed at some point in history. That being said, female artists have persisted in creating amazing art throughout the ages, and we’re going to continue discussing that today. Lavinia Fontana - Lavinia Fontana was one of great Italian mannerists of the sixteenth century and also happens to be one of the first Western, female artists with a well-documented career (there, of course, were many female artists before the sixteenth century, but their work was often anonymous or misattributed). She was (and is) quite famous in her home city of Bologna and was much in demand as a portrait artist as well as a ...

Self-Portrait with her Daughter, Julie Source: Wikimedia Commons In honor of Mother’s Day, I wanted to bring you one of the most famous—and controversial—paintings of a mother and child in Western Art. When Élisabeth Louise Vigée-Le Brun presented her self-portrait with her daughter to the Paris Salon, it caused a scandal . The casual pose and clothing of the mother and daughter, along with the mother’s smile caused controversy. Vigée-Le Brun depicted herself smiling with her teeth, an unconventional gesture that was regarded as vulgar or low-class at the time. The motif of mother and child typically received serious or even sombre treatment by contemporary artists; this was largely because of its thematic connection to the Madonna and Christ Child. Vigée-Le Brun’s decision to include this smile speaks to her desire to bring motherhood back down to Earth; her painting demystifies the relationship between mother and child, giving it a more natural and organic face in art. Lookin...

Julie Le Brun Looking in a Mirror Source: MET Museum Yesterday, we discussed the portrait of a young child, Manuel Osorio Manrique de Zuñiga. Portraits of children are common in the history of Western art, but they vary significantly based on time and place. Today, I want to introduce another child portrait, Julie Le Brun Looking in a Mirror . This image, which was painted by the child’s mother—a court artist who was famous for her portraits of Marie Antoinette—dates from around the same time as Goya’s painting of Manuel. However, it is very different in style. The artist, Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun, resided in France, a nation that was far more progressive than Goya’s Spain in terms of political and social ideas. The Enlightenment—a progressive movement that began in France—began to reimagine childhood in the eighteenth century. Gradually, an understanding developed that childhood was a distinct part of life and that children had unique developmental and emotional needs, as op...