Lavinia Fontana
Encyclopedia
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
painter.
Biography
Lavinia Fontana was born in BolognaBologna
Bologna is the capital city of Emilia-Romagna, in the Po Valley of Northern Italy. The city lies between the Po River and the Apennine Mountains, more specifically, between the Reno River and the Savena River. Bologna is a lively and cosmopolitan Italian college city, with spectacular history,...
, the daughter of the painter Prospero Fontana
Prospero Fontana
Prospero Fontana was an Italian painter of the late Renaissance.-Biography:Fontana was born in Bologna, and became a pupil of Innocenzo da Imola. He afterwards worked for Perin del Vaga in the Palazzo Doria in Genoa. Towards 1550, it is reported that Michelangelo introduced him to Pope Julius III...
, who was a prominent painter of the School of Bologna
Bolognese School (painting)
The Bolognese School or the School of Bologna of painting flourished in Bologna, the capital of Emilia Romagna, between the 16th and 17th centuries in Italy, and rivalled Florence and Rome as the center of painting. Its most important representatives include the Carracci family, including Ludovico...
at the time and served as her teacher. Continuing the family business was typical at the time.
Her earliest known work, " Monkey Child" , was painted in 1575 at the age of 23. Though this work is now lost, another early painting, Christ with the Symbols of the Passion, painted in 1576 is now in the El Paso Museum of Art
El Paso Museum of Art
Founded in 1959, The El Paso Museum of Art is located in downtown El Paso, Texas. First accredited in 1972, it is the only accredited art museum within a 250 mile radius and serves approximately 100,000 visitors per year. A new building was completed in 1998...
. She would go on to paint in a variety of genres. Early in her career, she was most famous for painting upper-class residents of her native Bologna
Bologna
Bologna is the capital city of Emilia-Romagna, in the Po Valley of Northern Italy. The city lies between the Po River and the Apennine Mountains, more specifically, between the Reno River and the Savena River. Bologna is a lively and cosmopolitan Italian college city, with spectacular history,...
. She began her commercial practice by painting small devotional paintings on copper, which had popular appeal as papal and diplomatic gifts, given the value and lustre of the metal. She later created paintings of male and female nudes and large scale religious paintings.
Fontana married Paolo Zappi (alternately spelled Paolo Fappi) in 1577. She gave birth to 11 children, though only 3 outlived her. After marriage, Fontana continued to paint to support her family. Zappi took care of the household and served as painting assistant to his wife, including painting minor elements of paintings like draperies.
Fontana and her family moved to Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
in 1603 at the invitation of Pope Clement VIII
Pope Clement VIII
Pope Clement VIII , born Ippolito Aldobrandini, was Pope from 30 January 1592 to 3 March 1605.-Cardinal:...
. She gained the patronage of the Buoncompagni, of which Pope Gregory XIII
Pope Gregory XIII
Pope Gregory XIII , born Ugo Boncompagni, was Pope from 1572 to 1585. He is best known for commissioning and being the namesake for the Gregorian calendar, which remains the internationally-accepted civil calendar to this date.-Youth:He was born the son of Cristoforo Boncompagni and wife Angela...
was a member. Lavinia thrived in Rome as she had in Bologna and Pope Paul V
Pope Paul V
-Theology:Paul met with Galileo Galilei in 1616 after Cardinal Bellarmine had, on his orders, warned Galileo not to hold or defend the heliocentric ideas of Copernicus. Whether there was also an order not to teach those ideas in any way has been a matter for controversy...
himself was among her sitters.
Some of her portraits, often lavishly paid for, have been wrongly attributed to Guido Reni
Guido Reni
Guido Reni was an Italian painter of high-Baroque style.-Biography:Born in Bologna into a family of musicians, Guido Reni was the son of Daniele Reni and Ginevra de’ Pozzi. As a child of nine, he was apprenticed under the Bolognese studio of Denis Calvaert. Soon after, he was joined in that...
. Chief among these are Venus
Venus
Venus is the second planet from the Sun, orbiting it every 224.7 Earth days. The planet is named after Venus, the Roman goddess of love and beauty. After the Moon, it is the brightest natural object in the night sky, reaching an apparent magnitude of −4.6, bright enough to cast shadows...
; The Virgin lifting a veil from the sleeping infant Christ; and the Queen of Sheba visiting Solomon
Solomon
Solomon , according to the Book of Kings and the Book of Chronicles, a King of Israel and according to the Talmud one of the 48 prophets, is identified as the son of David, also called Jedidiah in 2 Samuel 12:25, and is described as the third king of the United Monarchy, and the final king before...
. Her self-portrait – in youth she was said to have been very beautiful – was perhaps her masterpiece; it belongs to Count Zappi of Imola, the family into which Lavinia married.
While her youthful style was much like her father's, she gradually adopted the Carracciesque
Accademia degli Incamminati
The Accademia degli Incamminati was one of the first art academies in Italy. It was originally created around 1580 in Bologna as the Accademia dei Desiderosi and was sometimes known as the Accademia dei Carracci after its founders the Carracci cousins , with Annibale heading the institution thanks...
style, with strong quasi-Venetian coloring. She was elected into the Accademia di San Luca
Accademia di San Luca
The Accademia di San Luca, was founded in 1577 as an association of artists in Rome, under the directorship of Federico Zuccari, with the purpose of elevating the work of "artists", which included painters, sculptors and architects, above that of mere craftsmen. Other founders included Girolamo...
of Rome, and died in that city on August 11, 1614.
There are over 100 works that are documented, but only 32 signed and dated works are known today. There are 25 more that can be attributed to her, making hers the largest oeuvre for any female artist prior to 1700. Sofonisba Anguissola
Sofonisba Anguissola
Sofonisba Anguissola was an Italian painter of the Renaissance.-The Anguissola family:...
may have been an influence on her career.
Major works
- Self-Portrait with the Spinet Accompanied by a Handmaiden (1577) - Accademia Nazionale di San Luca, Rome
- Consecration to the Virgin, - Musee des Beaux-Arts, Marseilles, originally the Gnetti Chapel, Santa Maria dei Servi, Bologna
- Portrait of a Lady with Lap Dog (c. 1595) - Walters Art MuseumWalters Art MuseumThe Walters Art Museum, located in Baltimore, Maryland's Mount Vernon neighborhood, is a public art museum founded in 1934. The museum's collection was amassed substantially by two men, William Thompson Walters , who began serious collecting when he moved to Paris at the outbreak of the American...
, Baltimore - Portrait of Gerolamo Mercuriale (c. 1587-1590) - Walters Art MuseumWalters Art MuseumThe Walters Art Museum, located in Baltimore, Maryland's Mount Vernon neighborhood, is a public art museum founded in 1934. The museum's collection was amassed substantially by two men, William Thompson Walters , who began serious collecting when he moved to Paris at the outbreak of the American...
, Baltimore - Noli me tangere (1581) - Uffizi, Florence
- Assumption of the Virgin with Saints Peter Chrysologus, and Cassian (1584) - Palazzo Comunale, ImolaImolathumb|250px|The Cathedral of Imola.Imola is a town and comune in the province of Bologna, located on the Santerno river, in the Emilia-Romagna region of north-central Italy...
- Portrait of the Coozzadini Family (1584) - Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna
- Holy Family (1589) - El EscorialEl EscorialThe Royal Seat of San Lorenzo de El Escorial is a historical residence of the king of Spain, in the town of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, about 45 kilometres northwest of the capital, Madrid, in Spain. It is one of the Spanish royal sites and functions as a monastery, royal palace, museum, and...
, Outside Madrid - Birth of Virgin - Santissima Trinità, BolognaBolognaBologna is the capital city of Emilia-Romagna, in the Po Valley of Northern Italy. The city lies between the Po River and the Apennine Mountains, more specifically, between the Reno River and the Savena River. Bologna is a lively and cosmopolitan Italian college city, with spectacular history,...
- Portrait of a Couple (1580–1585) - Cleveland Museum of ArtCleveland Museum of ArtThe Cleveland Museum of Art is an art museum situated in the Wade Park District, in the University Circle neighborhood on Cleveland's east side. Internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian and Egyptian art, the museum houses a diverse permanent collection of more than 43,000...
, Cleveland - Deposition (1581) - Cornell Fine Arts
- Jesus among the Doctors - Part of the Mysteries of the Rosary in the Rosary chapel in the Basilica of San DomenicoBasilica of San DomenicoThe Basilica of San Domenico is one of the major churches in Bologna, Italy. The remains of Saint Dominic, founder of the Order of Preachers , are buried inside the exquisite shrine Arca di San Domenico, made by Nicola Pisano and his workshop, Arnolfo di Cambio and with later additions by Niccolò...
, Bologna