Sofonisba Anguissola and Louise Moillon are the latest monographs in the Illuminating Women Artists series, published in partnership with UK publisher Lund Humphries. These beautifully illustrated volumes contemplate and focus on the lives and oeuvre of these women in an effort to recognize their accomplishments, revive their name recognition, and make their works better known to art enthusiasts of the 21st century.
Sofonisba Anguissola, an Italian Renaissance painter born in Cremona to a relatively poor noble family, was one of the first women artists to establish an international reputation during her lifetime. Sofonisba Anguissola (Getty Publications, $45) explores the evolution of Anguissola’s art from her youth in Cremona through her service as a lady-in-waiting to the Spanish queen Elisabeth of Valois, to her later years as a married woman in Sicily and Genoa. Alongside discussions of Anguissola and her work, author Cecilia Gamberini offers a tantalizing exploration of Renaissance court life, detailing how the circles of influence and power operated.
Louise Moillon, born and raised in Paris, was the sole woman in a circle of Calvinist émigrés who brought their tradition of still-life painting with them from Flanders. During her lifetime, she was able to enjoy a degree of professional independence and attract enough recognition to be regarded as on a level with her male counterparts, yet her exquisite work and enigmatic story are little known today. Louise Moillon (Getty Publications, $40) examines some of the ways in which Moillon’s story has been represented since the revival of interest in her work and draws on recent scholarship to situate the painter in her rightful place. Offering a sweeping exploration of the genre of still life, this book also chronicles how a woman in early modern France was able to capture the attention of the artistic world, while dissecting why her prominence waned in the centuries following her death.
Author Information
Cecilia Gamberini has a PhD from Universidad Autónoma Madrid. She has written and lectured extensively on Sofonisba Anguissola.
Lesley Stevenson has a PhD from the Courtland Institute of Art and currently teaches at London Metropolitan University. Her previous publications include monographs on Gauguin, Renoir, Toulouse-Lautrec, and Manet.
Publication Information
Sofonisba Anguissola
Cecilia Gamberini
Getty Publications
144 pages, 7½ × 9⅞ inches
55 color illustrations
hardcover
ISBN: 978-1-60606-907-3
$45
Publication date: April 2, 2024
Sofonisba Anguissola
Louise Moillon
Lesley Stevenson
Getty Publications
112 pages, 7½ × 9⅞ inches
40 color and 1 b/w illustrations
hardcover
ISBN: 978-1-60606-902-8
$40
Publication date: April 2, 2024
Louise Moillon
Endorsements
Drawing upon a wealth of archival sources, Gamberini’s book offers fresh insights into Anguissola’s personal and professional life, including the complex web of familial and patronage networks that she navigated between Italy and Spain.Tanja L. Jones, Associate Professor, The University of Alabama
Both entertaining and rigorous, Cecilia Gamberini’s monograph offers us the artistic and personal history of one of the most important women artists of the modern era. Helped by the social and familial environments in which she grew up, Anguissola’s skills gave her mythical status. Taking in the quality and depth of Sofonisba's portraits, Gamberini depicts the long life and biographical adventures of a fascinating and unique personality.Leticia Ruiz Gómez, Director of Colecciones Reales of the Patrimonio Nacional, Spain
Louise Moillon’s works exude an atmosphere of contemplation and serenity: associations with the shaping of things by time come to mind. . . . Lesley Stevenson examines her artistic trajectory in this nimble, elegant book which will bring surprises.Blaise Ducos, Musée du Louvre, Chief Curator, Dutch & Flemish Painting
Louise Moillon rose out of a familial workshop in a Protestant colony of Paris’ Saint-Germain-des-Prés to make it into Georges de Scudéry’s famed musée imaginaire. Lesley Stevenson’s beautifully contextualized story shows how Moillon relied on the domestic, the intimate and the humble to make her exquisite trompe l’oeil works truly unique.Kathleen Wilson-Chevalier, Emerita Professor of Art History, The American University of Paris
