My name is Letizia Treves and I am the James and Sarah Sassoon
Curator of the Later Italian, Spanish, and 17th century French paintings
here at the National Gallery.
I'm absolutely delighted to talk to you today about our
new acquisition, this 'Self Portrait as Saint Catherine of Alexandria',
by Artemisia Gentileschi.
Now Artemisia is, without doubt, the most celebrated
female artist of the 17th century and it has been on our wish list
here at the Gallery to have a painting by her for a very long time
and we're delighted to have had the opportunity now
to buy this newly discovered work
and, not only as a work by Artemisia,
but the fact that we have a self-portrait
of the artist as well, it seemed like an opportunity too good to miss for us.
Like Caravaggio, Artemisia Gentileschi's life story
has somewhat overshadowed her artistic achievements.
In 1611, when she was just 17, something happened that really
changed her life both professionally and personally.
She was raped by the painter Agostino Tassi,
who was a collaborator and acquaintance of her father's, Orazio.
He'd been brought in to teach Artemisia the art of perspective.
A long trial followed and we know the details of that trial because the documents
survive and we know that Artemisia was tortured and she was subjected to really
grueling questioning.
Tassi was prosecuted but his punishment was never
enforced and so Artemisia was married off quickly to a Florentine artist
shortly afterwards and she left Rome for Florence and it's in Florence that she
arrives in 1612 as a young woman and it's the first chance that she can work
outside of the shadow of her father as well and it's from this period in
Florence between 1612 and 1620 where she sort of establishing her artistic
independence that this picture dates.
In this painting Artemisia decided to
portray herself as Saint Catherine of Alexandria, the 4th century saint,
Saint Catherine was tortured: she was tied to a wheel with iron spikes
and she was miraculously rescued by divine intervention
and here she is putting her hand on the wheel,
the instrument of her torture, and you can see here that it's broken
and what I love about this picture is it shows her as a martyr Saint:
she's holding the palm, she was later beheaded,
but actually she shows her resilience; a sort of quiet resilience in this picture.
It's at this time when Artemisia's working in Florence that she uses her
own image quite a lot.
We see a number of self-portraits that
survive from these days and there are others that are recorded in inventories
and described. She was clearly a very beautiful woman and she would have been
recognizable to people at the time but there is a sense, a kind of self
propaganda, in these pictures. There was clearly a demand for them but it's her
very much promoting her image in Florence to this very kind of elite
clientele at the Medici court and in this picture in particular the way she
puts her hand on the wheel, you know, she's actually survived the torture and
she's come through and I think it's that quiet determination and resilience which
one can't help but read into that also Artemisia's own story: that she survived
a very difficult personal event in her life and she sort of came through and
her artistic career in this moment in Florence,
when this picture was painted, really took off.
She is finding her feet as an independent artist.
She's the first woman to join the Accademia di Arte del Disegno
in Florence, at the Artists' Academy.
I find the image so powerful and I loved it from the moment I saw it in a photograph.
I think she's so arresting the way she looks out of the picture.
It has so much wall power and the pictures quite dirty.
I think the cleaning and restoration will really bring that, will out bring out a lot of the
three-dimensionality of the picture but I can't wait to hang it on the walls of
one of my Galleries but I can see her hanging quite comfortably next to
Caravaggio, next to her father Orazio.
Of course, she knew Caravaggio as a young girl:
her father was an associate of Caravaggio's and I think she'd really
hold her own next to these artists.
She's a very, very accomplished painter in her own right.