Lavinia Fontana
March is Women's History Month and we turn our focus to art created by women. It is time for Lavinia Fontana!
Lavinia Fontana was a Bolognese Mannerist painter active in Bologna and Rome. She is best known for her successful portraiture, but also worked in the genres of mythology and religious painting. She is regarded as the first female career artist in Western Europe as she relied on commissions for her income. Here she depicted Antonietta Gonsalvus, who with her father and siblings had hypertrichosis, which is an abnormal amount of hair growth over the body.
Antonietta's father first came to the court of Henry II, King of France in 1547. After the death of Henry II, 40 years later, he and his wife with their eight children were sent to the court of Margaret of Parma, regent of the Netherlands. The family became an object of medical inquiry by Ulisse Aldrovandi among others. Despite living and acting as nobles, the Gonsalvuses were not considered fully human in the eyes of their contemporaries. They eventually settled in Italy. It is believed that marriage between the parents of Antonietta, Petrus Gonsalvus and Lady Catherine, may have partially inspired the tale of Beauty and the Beast.
P.S. Lavinia Fontana's successful courtly career is a surprising story. If you would like to learn more about other women who shaped art history, please check our Women Artists Notebook.