i am sassa

Artemisia Gentileschi was a badass woman who was so far ahead of her time. She was born in Rome in 1593. Her mother died when she was just twelve years old, leaving her fully in the care of her father, who was a successful oil painter. He tried to pass his skills on to his sons, but Art’s brothers sucked at painting, so he focused on her. So much so that he hired several tutors to work with her.

One of Artemisia’s tutors, a real piece of work named Agostino Tossi, decided to rape her when she was 17. I’ll not include the gruesome details here, but I will say that Artemisia fought him like hell, even trying to kill him with a knife. Ok I’ll also share that she injured his wang, because that’s at least a tiny bit of justice. Dad was PISSED, so Tossi tried to smooth it over by saying he’d marry her. But oops! He was already married. And an established rapist/possible murderer.

There was a giant court battle, and naturally, given the culture of the time, Artemisia was examined in front of the judge and then tortured. Literally tortured in court to make sure she was being truthful. Eventually Tossi was found guilty, but shortly after that the ruling was overturned by the Pope, who probably just wanted a discount on a painting.

After the trial Artemisia would have been treated and seen as damaged goods, because 17th century Rome was a patriarchal cesspool. Regardless, she managed to be a successful artist. She was the first woman ever accepted into the Florentine Academy, and she painted circles around the boys. Like many artists at the time, Artemisia painted famous bible scenes, but her versions were very unique and obviously had a much different perspective.

The artist of the day who eventually would hog all the ink in the history books was Caravaggio. Artemisia would have likely been inspired by his work at the time, and used a similar style. But her paintings were SO MUCH COOLER THAN HIS. Let’s compare their two versions of Judith Beheading Holofernes, one of those quirky fun Bible murder tales. In Caravaggio’s version, Judith is all like ew, omg he’s bleeding yuck. She barely touches Holo with the sword that she holds as if it’s a dirty diaper. Her maid or whoever that other lady is looks on, utterly unhelpful.

Now let’s look at Artemisia’s take on the scene. First of all, I gotta say, ol’ Holofernes looks an awful lot like Agostino Tossi’s self portrait. Hmm. And I’ll be darned if Judith doesn’t bear a striking resemblance to Artemisia herself and dang she’s really putting her BACK INTO IT with that sword. She’s slicing his neck like a tough Thanksgiving turkey and the maid is holding him down. That, ladies, is how you use TEAMWORK. It’s also how you use dramatic light and dark, perfect composition, and the energetic movement of spurting blood to make a painting that should be renamed “Caravaggio Who?”.

Do yourself a favor and give Artemisia’s paintings a long look. This woman painted her absolute rage, and it is GLORIOUS to behold. She also really deserves the attention, because it took forever for her to take her rightful seat in art history.

My very first finished oil painting ever was an old master study of this same self portrait of Artemisia’s. The painting/evidence of it is long gone, and it’s probably just as well. I bet it sucked. I am so happy to have revisited her now and really learned about her life so I could honor her better.

Thank you, Artemisia Gentileschi.