Now You See Us: Women artists in Britain 1520-1920
Tate Britain, London
THIS is women’s work: brilliantly creative, tenacious, incandescent with passion, empathetic and rebellious.
There’s a word that crops up, though, in titles and texts: unknown. A portrait shows an Unknown Lady; it’s unknown where some artists trained; some painters had their names misspelled over the years. It’s almost as if no-one were paying attention to their talents.
We start with the work of Flemish-born Levina Teerlinc, whose miniatures were commissioned by Tudor monarchs. Records show she was highly paid, and contemporary artist Nicholas Hilliard thought her work so fine that he believed it had been painted by a man.
Alongside these royal portraits is the exquisite work of Esther Inglis. While Teerlinc may have been trained by her father, Inglis learned her craft of calligraphy from her mother. She penned some 60 books, illustrated with animals, flowers and fruit. Considered the first female artist to feature self-portraits, Inglis may whisper to today’s creatives: if you want them to remember you, include a selfie.
It comes as no surprise to see the phenomenal Artemisia Gentileschi represented here. She too benefited from royal patronage, in her case, Charles I, and the Royal Collection has deigned to lend Susanna and the Elders to the Tate.
It’s a visceral piece now, and viewing it in the 17th century must have rocked the patriarchy. The young wife bathing in her garden is spied on by two voyeurs who threaten her with rape. If she does not submit, she’ll be accused of adultery.
Gentileschi portrays Susanna in distress, her contrapposto, or counterpoise, signalling shock as the creeps leer at her.
We’ve already come a long way from Inglis’s handwritten books of psalms and botanical illustration.
There are some big themes, and not only in the trajectory of the work itself. Women were generally discouraged from developing skills, couldn’t join or participate in the academies, and were not allowed to paint life models.
In the face of this male malevolence, women’s collaborations came to the fore. Step forward, Maria Cosway, whose painting of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, in 1782, portrays her sitter as Cynthia (aka Diana, goddess of the moon). The white-robed figure strides through space, pushing away clouds. This is powerful rather than poetical, and when Cosway created it, she was 22 years old.
Although many female artists were dismissed as amateurs, painting pretty flowers as a mere hobby, there was real talent at play. Augusta Withers was a botanical illustrator employed by the Horticultural Society, and a co-founder of the Society of Female Artists, where she exhibited her work in 1857.
An attention-grabbing piece stands out, as it did in 1874. Elizabeth Butler’s canvas, The Roll Call, depicts the remnants of a battalion of guardsmen, many wounded, exhausted, some close to death,
The public had seen newspaper images of the Crimean war, but here was the plight of ordinary soldiers. The Victorians’ response was such that a policeman had to stand guard at the painting to hold back the crowds.
Not surprisingly, Butler’s work prompted critic John Ruskin to retract his statement that “no women could paint.”
A contemporary, Emily Osborn, began showing her work in the annual Royal Academy exhibition in 1851, at the age of 17. She would continue to do so over the next four decades.
Her painting, Nameless and Friendless, is a gem of social realism. A sad young woman, in mourning, alongside a young boy, shows her canvas to an art dealer, his sceptical expression showing disdain.
She is being gawped at by two men, also looking at a print of a pretty, bare-legged ballerina.
The woman’s clothes are shabby, her face pinched and anxious. An empty chair indicates that the dealer has not offered her a seat. A victim of her class and sex, the figure at the centre of this piece revealed the lot of the female artist, always dependent on men.
Florence Caxton’s satirical Women’s Work: A Medley (1861), centres a comfortably flabby chap, fawned upon by subservient females. Closer examination shows the women ready and able to carry out important work, but thwarted. This was first-wave feminism.
The advent of photography brought new opportunities, and with Pomegranates, Minna Keen staged her daughter Violet as the goddess Persephone. Her direct gaze at the camera defies her supposed victimhood.
It’s worth mentioning that, from its foundation in 1853, the Photographic Society of London welcomed women members. They couldn’t really attend meetings, deliberately scheduled in the evenings when women couldn’t leave the house without a chaperone.
As the first world war gripped the nation, Anna Airy found herself one of the few women chosen to work as a war artist. Her 1919 oil painting, Shop for Machining 15-Inch Shells: Singer Manufacturing Company, Clydebank, Glasgow, uses subdued light, in which the shells gleam, while the diminutive figures (mainly women) focus on their toil.
After some sustained campaigning, women were finally allowed to work with life models. LA (Ida) Knox created Male Figure Seated in 1918, securing her the joint first prize at the Slade School of Fine Art, where she trained alongside male artists.
It’s a perfectly executed piece, and a triumph of talent finally allowed to flourish.
I should confess to a conceit I’ve sometimes adopted, since seeing a fabulous exhibition in Berlin some years ago: Picasso, Dali and Miro’s work, shown in reverse chronological order.
It was enlightening, and I’ve sometimes marched to the end of the galleries and started there. But that’s not the best route to take, with this show. The strides these women took, over four centuries, should inspire all of us.
They were ignored, patronised, slighted and shelved. They survived, they thrived, their courage called to courage, and we can reap the delightful harvest of their fortitude.
Runs until October 13. For more information see: tate.org.uk.
