GROUP 2 - PRESENTATION SUMMARY

The Baroque Era-European art of the period from the early 17th century to the mid-18th century.

 Group 2: Yiran Fran, Amanda Fabri, Cecilia Fernandes, Karnjit Dhillon

Dutch Seventeenth Century Painting :

Conditions:

• The impact of the Renaissance.
• The growth of the middle class, who have more leisure time.
• The rapid growth and spread of natural science.

Two areas of painting

Flowers and genre (everyday life, realistic of domestic space)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwJmO3I9lWw

What was it like for women in the 17th and 18th centuries?

• Girls as young as 12 were sent away from home to labor long hours in the textile and garment trades.
• As much as 15 percent of the adult female population were prostitutes.
• If you were rich or middle class and one of your sisters got married first, your parents would probably blow their fortunes on her dowry, leaving you nothing, and you’d never marry.
• A woman who had children out of wedlock could be dismissed from her job or sent to prison.

Rachel Ruysch
Female painter - mostly floral paintings - served as an encouragement to other Dutch women and their hopes to become painters 

Ruysch’s paintings pops out at you with the dark background and bright colors in foreground. Her paintings are also recognized for their great detail

Rachael Ruych, Flowerpiece, 1700

Northern Europe - 17th Century

Although female artists were slowly being acknowledged during the 17th & 18th centuries, women were still overruled by the power and virility of men.

• Women often encouraged to focus on genres such as: portraits and domestic still lifes
• A woman’s work was noticed because of feminine qualities: delicate, domestic, or pleasing to the eye
• “The task of describing minute nature required the same qualities of diligence, patience, and manual dexterity that are often used to denigrate ‘women’s work’. Women were, in fact, critical to the development of the floral still life , a genre highly esteemed in the 17th century, but by the 19th, dismissed as an inferior one ideally suited to the limited talents of women amateurs” (Chadwick, 129).

18th Century France & England

• More emergence of professional women painters
  
• Women also began to speak out more:
• 
  “As long as the woman artist presented a self-image emphasizing beauty, gracefulness, and modesty, and as long as her paintings appeared to conform this construction she could, although with difficulty, negotiate a role for herself in the world of public art” (Chadwick, 139).
  
• It is during this time we encounter powerful women who challenged masculine dominated paintings!!!

Angelica Kauffmann

Angelica Kauffman, The Family of the Earl of Gower, 1772

Self-Portrait Hesitating Between Painting and Music ,1792

Angelica Kauffman fought back and was able to execute large-scale historical works (almost always done by men). She had little to no training at this level but was the only child of an artist who gave her music/painting lessons.

Her paintings reveal the era of heightened sensitivity, which celebrated strong feelings such as loss and loyalty.

Rebecca Scott

“The Perfect Hostesses” - seen on the right- was a representation of Scott acknowledging that she found pleasure in setting the table just right or buying silverware.

She then realizes that this domestic bliss is ONLY AIMED AT HER- not her male partner; it is the woman’s duty to be the perfect hostess.

By doing this, Scott brings light to the struggle that many women face and many times, even enjoy.