Sofonisba Anguissola's Reflection on the Discrimination against Women Artist

Reading Response
Name
Class Information
Date
Sofonisba Anguissola's Reflection on the Discrimination against Women Artist
The journal article "Here's Looking at Me: Sofonisba Anguissola and the Problem of the Woman Artist" by Mary D. Garrard aims to reveal the struggles of women artist during the male dominated society of Renaissance Italy. Garrard describes the artworks of a female artist named Sofonisba Anguissola, where the author uncovered the artist way of expressing her affection using her paintings. Although the article talks about the establishment of Anguissola's identity as an artist, her artworks should be further studied since they hold allegorical themes towards the artist self-expression with regards to the gender issues of that time period: the perspective of the patriarchal society about women, the view of male artist to women artist, the discrimination of women's artworks, and the hidden hints of femininity toward gender equality in art.
Painting is a male dominated territory during the Italian Renaissance where the expression of women values is defined by the social structure of the patriarchal system during that era. It is seen in Anguissola's Portrait of Giulio Clovio (1556-57), where Giulio is tightly holding a miniature portrait of a woman which connotes the male dominant grasp over women in society. Therefore, the mere existence of a woman artist was considered by society as a social "marvel." Annibale Caro, a connoisseur of art, took pleasure in appreciating self-portraits of women artist since his view of female painters reflect the special connection of art and female beauty that is symbolized by portraits of a woman. However, Garrard claims that in the sixteenth century, increased number of women portraits insinuate the ideal image of female beauty through eroticized artworks. The painting by Palma Vecchio, Blonde Woman (1520) and Titian's painting, Venus and Cupid with an organist (1550) invokes sexual arousal to objectify women in canvas as commodities for male fantasy of eroticism and power. The Blonde woman shows a portrait of a woman exposing her chest while Venus and Cupid with an organist, shows a fully naked woman in which a pianist stares at the naked body. This establishes the erotic context on which men sexualized the portrayal of the ideal female beauty.[Mary D. Garrard, “Here's Looking at Me: Sofonisba Anguissola and the Problem of the Woman Artist." Renaissance Quarterly 47, no. 3 (1994): 610. Accessed June 23, 2019. /stable/2863021] [Garrard, Here's Looking at Me, 576] [Garrard, Here's Looking at Me, 168] [Garrard, Here's Looking at Me, 566-568] [Garrard, Here's Looking at Me, 570] [Garrard, Here's Looking at Me, 571] [Garrard, Here's Looking at Me, 595] [Garrard, Here's Looking at Me, 570]
Sofonisba Anguissola was the first to challenge society's patriarchal conventions by consciously collapsing the "subject-object position" of her paintings as a starting point of redefining the meaning of women's portrayal of art. In her painting, Bernardino Campi Painting Sofonisba Anguissola (1550), she rendered the portrait of her teacher while painting a portrait of herself. This dual portrait was seen, at first as a depiction of the male teacher that endorses his student to the artist world as a fruit of his own labor; although, the painting looks like it is meant to idolize the teaching of the male teacher, Anguissola change the position, the size, and the brightness of the her portrait to imply the thematic display of her creativity. In the painting, the figure of her teacher and the canvas of her portrait are immersed in front of a darkened background. Her portrait in the canvas is brightened, enlarged, and positioned directly at the center plain of the artwork. The illuminated face and the presence of life in her portrait's eyes draw the spectators into her psychological space and time. The focus of the viewer’s eyes is directed towards her portrait while overshadowing the image of her teacher. Correespondingly, Garrard pointed out that the teacher was shown using an artist tool to support the hand while drawing, called a mahlstick. The mahlstick was known to represent the artist timidity; however, in Anguissola's perception, the mahlstick represents the teacher’s lack of creativity and lack of originality.[Garrard, Here's Looking at Me,...