Interrogating ‘The Bolognese Phenomenon’: Women Artists in Early Modern Bologna "Il fenomeno bolognese rivisto: Donne artiste a Bologna fra quattrocento e settecento" Babette Bohn

Bologna produced more women artists than any other Italian city during the early modern period. This presentation analyzes why Bologna was uniquely receptive to women and considers the characteristics that set Bolognese women apart from their contemporaries elsewhere, challenging some existing assumptions about how women became artists during this period. Key factors include unusual artistic patronage, local legends about learned women, and the growing acceptance of female students who were not family members in male painters’ workshops. Beginning with Malvasia in 1678, local writers created a new genre of literary encomia celebrating female artistic achievement, an oxymoron in an age that defined artistic invention as male. Bolognese male writers turned the accomplishments of their female compatriots into cultural capital for promulgating Bologna’s greatness. Bolognese women’s achievements included a shift from portraiture to history painting, numerous public commissions, and unusual diversity, including painters, printmakers, embroiderers, and even sculptors. They are also distinctive for their engagement with drawing, which linked all these female artists with the intellectual claims of

disegno

, fomenting a novel understanding of female creativity

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Professor Bohn’s lecture will be delivered in Italian.