Koller Review 2024

24 Women attempting to be professional artists in 17 th -century Europe faced a number of considera- ble obstacles. The greatest of these was perhaps the overwhelmingly prevailing sentiment that a career in art was just not appropriate for women. Women could ‘dabble’ in certain genres – still lifes, animals, eventually copies of male artists’ paintings – but never in what was regarded as the most no- ble of subjects: historical, religious and mythologi- cal scenes, and to consider them on the same level Sheer determi- nation: women artists as their male counterparts was for many, unthinkable. This was reinforced by the fact that training through drawing and painting live, nude models was denied to women, as was admission to art academies. Put simply, women of the time were restricted by what their families/husbands and the law allowed them to do. The women who managed to surmount these obstacles in the 17 th and later centuries did so almost wholly through sheer determination and the force of their own will. Some, like Artemesia Gentileschi (1593–1654) – to whom a paint- ing of Mary Magdalene was attributed in one of our past auctions – were fortunate to have been born into a family of artists, and so receive classical training. But Gentileschi Angelica Kauffmann. Cleopatra before Augustus. Circa 1805. Oil on paper on canvas. 25.7 × 33.1 cm. Sold for CHF 65 000 Giovanna Garzoni. Saint Catherine of Alexandria. Circa 1641. Gouache on vellum. 14.5 × 11 cm. Sold for CHF 50 000