Multitudinous Women: Now You See Us: Women Artists in Britain 1520–1920 @ Tate Britain, London

400 years of women artists. This exhibition was jam packed with works and could really have been half the size, perhaps running twice instead. It was an enormous exhibition to get round and you really needed atleast a good half a day to properly look at everything. Because there was a proliferation of works by female artists (maybe almost an over-abundance) and a better division would have been 1520–1820, and then 180-something through to 1920 (and beyond). It’s a shame that they stopped at 1920 when (beyond 1920) there were again so many female artists to be celebrated.

Staggering round the bountiful exhibition, there were many female painters, sculptors, printers, bookbinders and creatives to encounter. Lots I’d not heard of before (and I only made it out of the 18th century). The 19th and 20th centuries got short thrift — the epic Victorian war paintings, numerous sculptors and photographic genius Julia Margaret Cameron got brief look-ins. I’m not sure what was happening in the 20th century — probably Gwen John and some Bunburying Bloomsbury types. Did I miss Tirzah Garwood and Lizzie Siddall in there somewhere?

Albeit having to cut things short — one of the first exhibitions where people genuinely didn’t want to leave and the staff were so very patient with us in patiently encouraging us to stop looking at the art and leave. I am surprised that they didn’t offer a later showing for the last couple of days as there was so much to look at!

Which maybe I wasn’t expecting from an exhibition of women’s art — very wrongly as it turned out. And more than the usual famous suspects. It was intriguing to see whose families (mostly fathers or husbands) were supportive and those who were thwarted in their talents and ambitions by their husbands, social conventions and expectations — or perhaps by themselves. Could they paint or create commercially according to taste? (and pocket)? One female artist went to Italy, but could not stomach the current painting vogue of showing subjects ‘flying in the air’. Maria Cosway was totally about this, painting an epically vast canvas with Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire as Cynthia, exploding from the sky and almost out of the canvas, surrounded by wafts of fabric.

It was delightful too to encounter Mary Beale, celebrated 17th century portraitist (a cheaper version), who was supported by her husband. They were partners. She produced some very charming portraits of her children. I enjoyed the female 17th century artist who ‘borrowed’ Lely’s poses and hand gestures — and would (for a cheaper price) turn you into a Lely goddess. They would even produce a smaller, cheaper (more portable) version of knock-off Lely’d you. Or you could be successful by being cheaper but just as comparable to the style of William Dobson.

Or Joan Carlie, where you could count on being beautified in the same glamourous white satin dress with very elegant hands, plus neckline adjustments for personal taste, 17th-century style. And why not when your likeness was being captured by the one of the first professional women artists and commercially successful too?!

Teetering into the early 19th century, I could not understand why the husband of a socially feted female artist wouldn’t let her paint. Whilst avoiding the tedium of previous experiences (and actually giving us facts and information), the husband’s attitude was merely stated, that he didn’t like her painting/working commercially — and we were left to wonder — and assume — a lot. I would have liked to know more about his public reasoning — was he anti-women earning a living, did it shame him somehow? Or was he worried and protective of her social reputation? Or did he think her puffed up and her art bad? Or did he think that society was fickle and want to protect her from the slings, arrows and buffets of outrageous fortune? Did he want to see and think women should be purely in the domestic sphere? Given that the woman was a favourite of Queen Charlotte (capturing her in an intimate portrait as a mother), it seems bizarre that her husband would scruple (even avoid) such a literal cash cow. Unless ofcourse he was stupid, a Republican, or jealous of his wife’s fame. But we’ll never know in this information card presentation of him as a patriarchal man.

You also wonder how typical he was of his class, his time. Artemisia’s father apprenticed her pretty much — and they worked together. She was even having children, carrying pregnancies, managing a family and household — whilst also running a commercial studio. And frequently creating the money to sustain them all. Ditto Angelica Kauffman, who could even celebrate herself and her talent as a God-given, divine thing — and was positively encouraged by her father. Mary Beale’s husband was a true partner. Other women were encouraged by their fathers into science through botanical art — and adventures, and travel. Even if ‘flower painting’ was frequently seen as ‘lesser’ — it could get you into Royal Academician membership.

Some women however battled to make it, using their artistic talents to feed and provide for their families. To make money. Some had to battle their stingy unappreciative clients and their nasty remarks (and refusal to pay up as agreed), abandoning the life of an artist altogether to become drawing teachers instead. Others were drawing the body — and we don’t know how or where they found the models (and if they were indeed drawing them as shown). And we’ll never know — for a lot of the time we know so little about the women beyond their works. But what is clear — women were busting out of drawing rooms into creating art all over the place.

Others were doing their own thing and being gossiped about for it, such as sculptor Eleanor Coade— who even created their own secret Coade stone recipe to create works with. I lost of a lot of time in the 19th-century looking at a very sweet Coade terracotta sculpture of two very hairy dogs curled up together. If you challenged a newly painted subject to pay up, they might disrespect your art, refuse to pay for your work and throw sexual slurs at you into the bargain. For example, one grumpy gent who objected to his representation in paint, the price he was being charged and called the painter ‘a whore’. In societies where female reputation really mattered, this must have stung. You also have to wonder how much class was coming into play as rich men tried to rip off working women, who they deemed their inferiors (and tried to treat like actresses).

Others however, like Angelica Kauffman, enjoyed the vicarious social whirl, managed to impress and entrance polite and fashionable society, and be a welcome, refined addition to any company — or to any wall. And she did big history paintings. Other female artists were thrilled to be in the capital of art — Rome. (Where there were also rich patrons with plentiful wallets to be found). Then there were the two female Academicians, who couldn’t join the men literally in their group portrait — and had to be consigned to classical motifs on the walls, at a distance. I’m glad to say that Angelica Kauffman broke that when she painted rondels, large visible wheels of works, to go on the ceiling for all to see. (Including ofcourse women creating as their theme, painting, architecture and more….)

Katherine Read gives us real women, inspite of the highly stylised, elaborate and romanticised settings. And she goes to Rome, travels to India capturing the officers stationed there, she’s a professional artist at work — and her professionalism extends to the subjects she paints.

Mary Grace was another painter demanding to be taken seriously.

Even as a married woman, she produced and created art, she exhibited annually, she was elected to join a company of artists. No wonder her self-portrait has her resplendently, proudly and magnificently displaying her artist’s palette and brushes, paints at the ready. Look what I can do, she screams gloriously at us in paint and self-portrait!

The 19th century showed the divergence of female produced art — from the humanitarian war paintings by Lady Butler (Elizabeth Thompson) to detailed botanical drawings and still life to sculptures. (Even Queen Victoria’s own daughter was a talented sculptress). Then, they discovered the sensation of photography — such as Julia Margaret Cameron. There might also have been Pre-Raphaelites and Arts and Crafts too.

By comparison the 20th century was about huge canvases. Not so much a room of woman’s own as a whole studio of one’s own.

Whilst I find Evenly de Morgan’s own life strange, her painting of The Christian Martyr (Nazuraea) extraordinary, purely because it places a woman centre stage, in charge of her own decisions and destiny, in charge of her own beliefs and faith choices.

What would have been interesting (if the exhibition could have been broken into a more manageable two-parter) would have been a diversion into how women used art (in the public and private spheres). For example, the Suffrage movement, Abolition, pacifists and war supporters in the World Wars. This could have brought in things such as the Suffragette factory toys and ceramicists such as Clarice Cliff. There’s so much to be said here about how you showed your taste (and perhaps your place) through the art you used everyday and had around you. This would then (ofourse) had led to more Arts and Crafts, Samborne House and even the avant-garde. Before encountering women who did successfully manage careers as commercial and professionally successful artists — viz. Madame Yevonde and more.

A second-part leading to modern times would have allowed us to reflect and evaluate how far women have come since 1920 — and yet how much remains the same.

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