Becoming Painters

This study reveals how women artists between 1550 and 1650 gained skills, visibility, and professional status despite the constraints of their time.

Between 1550 and 1650, several women in Italy and Northern Europe managed to establish themselves as successful artists. Their achievements were the results of deliberate strategies that allowed them to gain access to a profession dominated by men.

Becoming Painters focuses on how these women worked as artists. It explores the varied forms of artistic education available to them – from training in the family's workshop (particularly by the father) to self-taught methods, guild education in Northern Europe, education in convents, and, more rarely, formal academic training.