Women of the

Renaissance
What will we learn about
women during the time of
the Renaissance?
- What their lives were like
according to their social
status
- Women who excelled in
the arts such as Sofonisba
Anguissola
 The Social Status of
Women
• During the Renaissance, women were
effectively second-class citizens: they could
not formally participate in politics and were
legally under the control of their husbands.
Life varied across the social classes
• Upper-class women would marry or become a
nun.
• Middle-class women had very limited
opportunities to work.
• Lower-class women worked in agriculture in
the countryside and at various jobs in towns and
cities. They also looked after their families.
 Source on attitudes
towards women
- Q1. Is this a primary or secondary
source? Explain why.
- Q2. What form of source (written,
visual, oral, aural or tactile) is this
and explain why?
- Q3. Is this a reliable source? Can
we trust it? How do we know it is
a Renaissance source?
- Q4. Is this a useful source? What
information (evidence) does it
provide us about attitudes towards
women during the Renaissance?
‘Women should follow these
rules: the first is that they
should bring up their
children in the fear of God;
and the second is that they
should keep quiet in church.’
- an extract from Lives of
Illustrious Men of the 15th
Century (1475) by
Vespasiano da Bisticci
Sofonisba Anguissola
• Born in Cremona in 1532 into a
noble (upper-class) family.
• Her parents encouraged her
artistic talents and apprenticed her
with a nearby master who later
taught her sisters.
• She went to Rome to study other
great works of art while sketching
people and scenes.
• Michelangelo recognised her
talent and gave advice on her
sketches.
 Anguissola
cont.
• Anguissola painted several self
portraits of herself and
portraits of her own family
members.
• Women were prohibited from
studying anatomy and as a
result, Anguissola’s works
depict more ordinary
everyday people and
situations.
• The painting to the right is The
Game of Chess, depicting her
sisters (Lucia, Minerva and
Europa) playing the popular
board game.
 Portrait of the
Artist's Family
(although not her entire
family. Here we see her
father, Amilcare, her
sister, Minerva and her
brother, Asdrubale.)
 Portrait of
Bianca Ponzoni
Anguissola
(Sofonisba’s
mother)
 Spain and Final Years
• Anguissola was so well regarded
that the King of Spain invited her
to reside in his court and paint him
and other members of the royal
family.
• Her talents were challenged as
she was faced with painting very
detailed outfits worn by members
of the royal family.
 Spain and Final Years
cont.
• Anguissola spent the rest of her life
in Spain. She was married twice
and was still painting in her later
years when her eyesight started
to fade.
• Anguissola was the leading female
artist of the Renaissance and
proved a significant inspiration
for aspiring female artists.
Age before Beauty
 Lavinia Fontana
• One of the artists inspired by
Anguissola was Lavinia Fontana
from Bologna.
• She was trained by her father,
Prospero Fontana who was, himself,
an accomplished artist.
• Most of her paintings were
portraits.
• She is regarded as one of the first
professional female artist as she
relied solely on her art for income.
• Whilst being a painter, Fontana was
married and was the mother of 11
children.
Assumption of
the Virgin with
Saints Peter
Chrysologus
and Cassian
 Portrait of
Antonietta
Gonsalvus
Note on the painting: the girl in
the painting suffered from
hypertrichosis, the abnormal
growth of hair on the body.
 Fede Galizia
• Another female artist to
follow the example of
Anguissola was Fede
Galizia from Milan.
• She is one of the earliest
painters of still lifes
(paintings done of
inanimate objects such as
fruit or flowers).
• She was quite an
independent artist as
she did not access the
upper-classes of society
for patronage.
 Who’s getting hungry?
Cherries in a silver compote with Glass tazza with peaches,
crabapples on a stone ledge jasmine flowers and apples
Portrait of Paolo Morigia
 Renaissance Cosmetics
• The ideal for Renaissance beauty consisted of
blonde hair, pale skin and rosy cheeks and lips.
• Dying hair blonde: apply a paste made from
alum (a type of salt) and let it set for two days.
You can also wash your hair with lemon juice
combined with yellow extracts from lupins,
artemisia and fig-plants.
• Whitening the skin: wash the skin with donkey
milk or apply a paste made from cedar, pig lard,
white wax and salammoniac (a mineral).
• Blush and lipstick: dill seed mixed with wine or
honey.
• Hair removal: apply a mixture of tortoise, frog
and owl blood, ant eggs, red orpiment (arsenic
mineral) and vinegar.
 Before we finish
Renaissance
painting, I want
us to look at some
unusual paintings
by Giuseppe
Arcimboldo.
 Now You Can
Laugh
Can you list all the
fruits, flowers and
vegetables that
make up this guy?
What title
would you
give to this
painting?