Born: 1593, Rome, Papal States [Italy]
Died: 1652/53, Naples, Kingdom of Naples
Artemisia Gentileschi was an Italian baroque painter, one of the few well-known female artists of her era, and an influential artist who developed the compositions of great expressive power and originality. Gentileschi was known for her inventive adaptation of the techniques of Italian artist Caravaggio, including the skilful use of chiaroscuro (strong contrasts of light and dark), and a dramatic presentation of narrative.
Born in Rome, the daughter of painter Orazio Gentileschi, she studied with her father and with Agostino Tassi, a local fresco painter. In 1612, Tassi was put on trial and served a brief prison sentence for sexually assaulting Artemisia. This event is thought to have influenced the treatment she chose for one of her earliest known paintings, Susannah and the Elders (1610, Count von Schonborn Collection, Pommersfelden, Germany), completed when she was probably just 17 years old. Gentileschi’s painting differs significantly from the traditional artistic treatment of this often-depicted story, emphasizing Susannah’s distress at being spied upon, rather than the voyeur’s delight in peeking.
Shortly after her teacher’s trial, Gentileschi married and moved to Florence. She introduced the Caravaggesque style of painting to the Florentines and, during this period, created one of her most dramatic baroque compositions, Judith Beheading Holofernes (about 1620, Uffizi Gallery, Florence). This gruesomely realistic work shows Judith and her maidservant in the act of slicing off the head of Holofernes. It is one of at least seven paintings by Gentileschi depicting this biblical story in which Judith, a virtuous widow, seduces and murders the marauder Holofernes with his own sword.
Between 1621 and 1630, Gentileschi lived mostly in Rome, where she encountered competition from the followers of Bolognese painter Annibale Carracci, who promoted a return to the classical ideal of the High Renaissance. In 1630, Gentileschi settled in Naples, where the Caravaggesque style she favoured was still in demand. In her later years, she gave in to the popular trend towards more idealized, brightly illuminated figures, but her paintings in this newer style are considered to be inferior to her early work.
