Why have there been no great women artists in history?

Aug 2, 20213 min read

If you look through the list of the most famous and acknowledged artists, you’ll notice that most of them are men. Fortunately, this is gradually changing, but the question “why have there been no great women artists?” still needs to be answered. Some still think that women don’t possess enough talent or creative genius in order to create masterpieces, but this is an outdated, stereotypical and sexist view. In order to find the real answer to this question, we need to take multiple factors into consideration.

When discussing this issue, it’s important to ask two main questions: 1. Have women had enough opportunities and rights to devote themselves to art and create masterpieces? 2. Have there really been no great women artists throughout history or are we unaware of their work?

Historically women had to face additional challenges and hardships to create art. Women haven’t had access to adequate education and training necessary to become artists. First academies of art were created during Renaissance, but most of them didn’t accept female students. Independent masters and artists didn’t take women as apprentices because of the stereotypical views, and private lessons were too expensive, so only a few affluent families could afford them. Women gained the right to attend art academies at the end of the 18th century, but even in this case, they didn’t have access to the same quality education as men. For example, women weren’t allowed to paint nude models and learn to draw human figures from anatomy. This limited their mode of expression to only still life, landscapes, and portraits but these styles of painting weren’t considered valuable or high art. Consequently, this gave rise to numerous stereotypes, according to which women weren’t capable of creating high art. Society doubted women due to these stereotypes, which hindered many gifted women to demonstrate and develop their talent.

The second fundamental obstacle for women was gender roles. Historically, thinking about career and profession was alien to women, because they were raised primarily to marry and take care of their families. Thus, many girls weren’t thinking about acquiring a profession, especially becoming an artist, which was considered inappropriate or unsuitable for women. Even if a woman had had the intention of becoming an artist and somehow managed to gain art education, art wasn’t a profitable profession, because women’s work wasn’t taken seriously. This attitude is well illustrated in Emily Mary Osborn’s painting “Nameless and Friendless” accompanied by a proverb “The rich man’s wealth is his strong city”. A young female artist is trying to sell her painting to an art dealer, but the man’s doubting, scornful expression foreshadows a rejection. The woman’s sad eyes and nervous hand movements indicate her vulnerability and hopelessness and demonstrate the hardships that women had to face in Victorian England (during the second half of the 19th century). Unlike other women artists, Emily Osborn, the author of this painting, had a successful career and was supported by Queen Victoria herself. Thus, Emily used her privilege and power to improve the lives of women. She was actively involved in the women’s suffrage movement and used her paintings to bring forward women’s problems and make political statements.

Despite the many obstacles mentioned in this article, there were a few successful women artists who confronted the stereotypes and managed to create valuable artworks. Unfortunately, many critics were biased against women and didn’t consider their work significant enough to introduce it to the broader public or include it in the canon (the established timeline of artists who are sometimes considered as old masters or great artists). Due to this, throughout the centuries even the work of those female artists who endured discrimination has been neglected, overlooked, and ignored. We don’t know female artists not because there weren’t any, but because they were forgotten due to gender discrimination. Fortunately, nowadays several museums are trying to rediscover and recover paintings by these female artists, however, their names still remain unknown to the broad public. Such artists include Sofonisba Anguissola, Caterina van Hemessen, Fede Galizia, Artemisia Gentileschi, Marie-Gabrielle Capet, Margaret Mackintosh, Mary Cassatt, and others. If we talk about these artists more often and appreciate their work, then we’ll encourage many young female artists to develop their skills and talent.