Academic literature on the topic 'Unknown Women Artists'

Abstract Maria Vasilievna Iakunchikova designed three works of applied art and craft in a Neo-Russian style for the Russian section of the Paris “Exposition Universelle” of 1900—a wooden dresser, a toy village in carved wood, and a large embroidered panel. Yet, so far as the official record is concerned, Iakunchikova’s participation in the exhibition is occluded. Her name does not appear in the catalogue, for it was the producers, rather than the designers, who were credited for her works. Indeed, her presence might have been entirely unknown, were it not for several reports of the Russian display in the periodical press by her friend Netta Peacock, a British writer living in Paris. The invisibility of the designer in this instance was not a matter of gender, but it had consequences for women artists. In general, women were marginalized in the mainstream of the nineteenth-century Russian art world—whether at the Academy of Arts or in prominent groups such as the Peredvizhniki—and, as a result, enjoyed fewer opportunities at the Exposition. But the Neo-national movement, linked closely with the revival of applied art and the promotion of kustar industries, was one in which women’s art had space to flourish. And, in the so-called village russe at the Exposition, which featured a display of kustar art, by far the larger contribution was made by women, both as promoters and as artists. In this article, I examine Iakunchikova’s contribution to the Exposition within a broader context of female artistic activity, and the significance of the Russian kustar pavilion for a gendered history of nineteenth-century art.

This article offers a chronological survey of the development of women’s art in China between 1990 and 2010. Outlining the historical circumstances that first resulted in the dearth of a female consciousness in Chinese art until the end of the twentieth century, this article touches on the divergent roots of the women’s liberation movement and western feminism, the Maoist era’s negation of femininity, and the lingering patriarchal structure of art institutions. It was only after a series of groundbreaking exhibitions exploring the female psyche in the 1990s that women artists found a space to voice their female subjectivities, and still they struggled to resist the slippery essentialism of a “women’s art” fad. The new millennium saw women artists expanding their thematic horizons, breaching important political and social issues as well as such subjects as ecology, astronomy, gemology, and urbanization, with many forgoing the label of feminist—or even women’s—art. Each sought to transcend the limitations of personal experience and achieve a greater human resonance. This study examines the work of thirteen women artists whose careers are relatively unknown in the English language, ultimately delving into the complex relationships among sex, gender, humanity, and art in contemporary China.

The art of the Soviet era attracts more and more attention of researchers and the public year by year. The exhibitions held over the past decades in Russia and abroad, the published monographs dedicated to works of art of the era and particular artists, the international creative contacts in cultural field — all of that has introduced previously unknown works into art history studies, which has allowed to re-evaluate the objectives and tasks of the art of the period and the development of the artistic process in general. That is why it is of great interest to study the ways the plastic arts formed and developed in the 1920’s and 1930’s. The 1917 revolution in its foundations had not just a change in social and political reality, but also a change in the very essence of man. The new era demanded a new hero, shaped his appearance in its works. The soviet man, thought of as a new man, became a fundamentally new object of art. If the 1920’s became the time of the search in proletarian art and the flourishing of avant-gardism, then in the 1930’s the objective of art in building the lifeworld of a new man began to be understood much narrower and stricter, and this Man who perceives art began to be described as a “normal” (that is, average, “ordinary”) consumer of cultural tradition. The “New Man” in the plastic arts of the 1920’s and 1930’s was formed as the new hero of society; avant-garde artists sought his originality in the images of generalized and abstract aviators, peasants, women; artists of socialist realism began to form the images of “typical” heroes of the time (military men, athletes, rural workers, scientists) as new “Renaissance people”, equally ready for work and defense. At the same time, two main tendencies, two directions that correspond to the two tasks of socialist realism, clearly lie in the image of the “new” Soviet man: the depiction of reality (that is, the new Soviet man that really exists) and the depiction of the ideal (that is, the ideal man).

The article analyzes the conditions and factors that influenced the formation of contemporary art and cinema in China, South Korea and Japan. We can determine the peculiarities of the development of Chinese contemporary art, such as the desire of the first artists, after the Cultural Revolution, to reflect its flux and effects as much as possible. Further, artistic tendencies become diverse: the commercial component and a certain element of the state of affairs are viewed in the works of art by Chinese authors, but the desire for self-expression in different ways testify to the progressive phenomena characteristic of art. Modern Korean art proves that the scientific and technological revolution and the dominant avant-garde component of mass culture in general cannot supplant the ultimate traditional artistic creativity. One of the characteristic features of contemporary Korean art is a demonstration of belonging to the culture of the country. First of all, this is the influence of the traditions of Confucianism, Buddhism, along with the painful memories of war and long-term colonization by Japan. One can note the simplicity, orderliness, harmony of colors and shapes as an inalienable feature of Korean contemporary art, but modern tendencies show the striving for the discovery of individuality of the artist, which manifests itself in non-standard artistic forms. Japanese visual art combines the works of autochthonous traditions and European artistic principles. Considerable attention is paid to the issue of the relationship between nature and man, reflected in the work of adherents of the synthesis of Japanese traditions and Western variety of forms. Particular attention is paid to contemporary artists in Japan with the latest technology – video art, 3D painting, interactive installations and installations-hybrids. Chinese cinema with the generation of directors, known as the Fifth Generation, reveals new trends. These artists initially sought to convey events and tragedies during the Cultural Revolution, but over time they turned to other themes and genres. Directors of the "Sixth Generation" paid special attention to social problems, the place of action in their films is unknown China – small settlements or cities. Modern Korean cinema covers two large areas: cinema for women – melodrama, and for men – adventure. Today the adventure genre is oriented mainly to teens, and the melodrama genre has been transformed from the problems of the middle-aged women's interest towards the youth audience, therefore, it is more likely to come closer to the romantic comedy. The tragedy of Korea, which is split up into two parts, worries the movie-makers. In recent years there have been changes in South Korean position in exposing North Korean residents. If the previous decades in South Korean cinema was cultivating the image of the enemy: North Korean could be either a spy or killer, but now the inhabitants of North Korea are perceived and presented in films differently, not embodying exclusively negative features. In Japanese cinema, the emphasis is on the visual array, which allows you to bring forward contemplation and the deep meaning is transmitted by artistic images typical of the oriental art in general. In films, much attention is paid to the smallest details; certain asceticism along with the aesthetization of the frame is a reflection of purely Japanese features – minimalism as the meaning of existence. Familiarity with the peculiarities of the development of contemporary art and cinema in China, Korea and Japan is a necessary component for further dialogue between the cultures of East and West in terms of balanced interaction and artistic transformations of the modern world.

Even though the annexation of Bosnia by the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in 1908 raised the tension between the Monarchy and the Ottomans, Hungaro-Turkish political, economic, and cultural relations significantly improved from the beginning of the twentieth century until the end of the First World War. With the eruption of the Great War these friendly relations turned into a war alliance, where suddenly the battlefields became fields of joint effort. As a consequence, the outbreak of the war caused intensification of mutual visits and the arrival of Hungarian soldiers, journalists, and even artists and religious representatives in greater numbers in the Ottoman Empire. In this paper the author mainly focuses on Hungarian accounts of different Ottoman fronts during the First World War, while not forgetting to put all these activities in the frame of the wartime alliance. War correspondents like Béla Landauer, István Dobay, and Jenő Heltai from different Hungarian journals, soldiers from the Austro-Hungarian Army like Dr Emil Vidéky and Dr László Király, the painter Géza Maróti, and even a military chaplain, Pál Schrotty left behind detailed memoirs of environments ranging from the picturesque Bay of Izmir to the desert of Palestine. These mostly unknown depictions reveal the cruelty of the war, research the healthcare system of the capital, and provide detailed accounts of the Berlin-Bagdad line and historical sites in the Empire, while also raising questions regarding the situation of Turkish women.

The 1920s have been touted as the golden era of jazz and Black history in Montréal. Similarly, the decade is well known for the Harlem Renaissance, a key moment in African American art history. Yet this period in Black Canadian art histories remains largely unknown. As a first step toward shedding some light on this period in Black Canadian art history, I propose to use what I term a Black feminist art-historical (bfah) praxis to discuss some visual art practices undoubtedly active alongside well-known jazz musicians and cultural producers in 1920s Montréal. This paper presents an overview of critical race art history and feminist art history, as well as Black feminist approaches to visual representation, to outline what might be considered four tenets of bfah praxis. Applying these tenets, I propose that a new art history may emerge from well-known art objects and practices as well as lesser-known ones. I posit that through a deliberately bfah approach, new meanings emerge and the voices of Black women, even when obstructed by mainstream white narratives, may begin to stand out and shed light upon a variety of histories. This praxis aims to underline the subtext lurking at the edges of these images and to make intangible presences visible in the archive and in art history. I propose bfah as a strategy for more nuanced discussion of the work of Black Canadian artists and histories that have by and large been left out of official records.

Background. The name of Amanda Maier (married – Röntgen-Maier), the Swedish violinist, composer, pianist, organist, representative of the Leipzig school of composition, contemporary and good friend of С. Schumann, J. Brahms, E. Grieg, is virtually unknown in the post-Soviet space and little mentioned in the works of musicologists from other countries. The composer’s creativity has long been almost completely forgotten, possibly due to both her untimely death (at the age of 41) and thanks to lack of the research interest in the work of women composers over the past century. The latter, at least in domestic musicology, has significantly intensified in recent decades, which is due in part to the advancement in the second half of the XX and early XXI centuries of a constellation of the talanted women-composers in Ukraine – L. Dychko, H. Havrylets, A. Zagaikevych, I. Aleksiichuk, formerly – G. Ustvolska, S. Gubaydulina in Russia, etc. Today, it is obvious that the development of the world art is associated not only with the activities of male artists, but also with the creative achievements of women: writers, artists, musicians. During her life, A. Maier was the well-known artist in Europe and in the world and the same participant in the musical-historical process as more famous today the musicians of the Romantic era. Objectives and methodology. The proposed study should complement the idea of the work of women-composers of the 19th century and fill in one of the gap on the music map of Europe at that time. The purpose of this article is to characterize the genre-stylistic and compositional-dramaturgical features of selected chamber music works by A. Röntgen-Maier. In this research are used historical-stylistic, structural and functional, analytical, comparative, genre methods. Research results. Carolina Amanda Erika Maier-Röntgen was born in Landskrona, Sweden, where she received her first music lessons from her father. Then she studied at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm, where she mastered playing on the several instruments at once – violin, cello, piano, organ, as well as studied the music theory. She became the first woman received the title of “Musik Direktor” after successfully graduating from college. She continued her studies at the Leipzig Conservatory – in the composition under Carl Reineke and Ernst Friedrich Richter direction, in the violin – with Engelbert Röntgen (concertmaster of the Gewandhaus Orchestra, the father of her future husband J. Röntgen). She toured Europe a lot, firstly as a violinist, performing her own works and her husband’s works, alongside with world classics. After the birth of her two sons, she withdrew from active concert activities due to the deterioration of her health, but often participated in music salons, which she and her husband organized at home, and whose guests were J. Brahms, C. Schumann, E. Grieg with his wife, and A. Rubinstein. It is known that Amanda Maier performed violin sonatas by J. Brahms together with Clara Schumann. The main part of the composer’s creative work consists of chamber and instrumental works. She wrote the Sonata in B minor (1878); Six Pieces for violin and piano (1879); “Dialogues” – 10 small pieces for piano, some of which were created by Julius Röntgen (1883); Swedish songs and dances for violin and piano; Quartet for piano, violin, viola and cello E minor (1891), Romance for violin and piano; Trio for violin, cello and piano (1874); Concert for violin and orchestra (1875); Quartet for piano, violin, viola and clarinet E minor; “Nordiska Tonbilder” for violin and piano (1876); Intermezzo for piano; Two string quartets; March for piano, violin, viola and cello; Romances on the texts of David Wiersen; Trio for piano and two violins; 25 Preludes for piano. Sizable part of the works from this list is still unpublished. Some manuscripts are stored in the archives of the Stockholm State Library, scanned copies of some manuscripts and printed publications are freely available on the Petrucci music library website, but the location of the other musical scores by A. Maier is currently unknown to the author of this material; this is the question that requires a separate study. Due to the limited volume of the article, we will focus in detail on two opuses, which were published during the life of the composer, and which today have gained some popularity among performers around the world. These are the Sonata in B minor for Violin and Piano and the Six Pieces for Violin and Piano. Sonata in B minor is a classical three-part cycle. The first movement – lyricaldramatic sonata allegro (B minor), the second – Andantino – Allegretto, un poco vivace – Tempo I (G major) – combines lyrical and playful semantic functions, the third – Allegro molto vivace (B minor) is an active finale with a classical rondosonata structure. The Six Pieces for Violin and Piano rightly cannot be called the cycle, in the Schumann sense of this word, because there is no common literary program for all plays, intonation-thematic connections between this musical numbers, end-to-end thematic development that would permeate the entire opus. But this opus has the certain signs of cyclization and the common features to all plays, contributing to its unification: tonal plan, construction of the whole on the principle of contrast, genre, song and dance intonation, the leading role of the violin in the presentation of thematic material. Conclusions and research perspectives. Amanda Maier’s chamber work freely synthesizes the classical (Beethoven) and the romantic (Schubert, Mendelssohn, Schumann) traditions, which the composer, undoubtedly, learned through the Leipzig school. From there come the classical harmony, the orderliness of her thinking, clarity, conciseness, harmony of form, skill in ensemble writing, polyphonic ingenuity. There are also parallels with the music of J. Brahms. With the latter, A. Maier’s creativity correlates trough the ability to embody freely and effortlessly the subtle lyrical psychological content, being within the traditional forms, to feel natural within the tradition, without denying it and without trying to break it. The melodic outlines and rhythmic structures of some themes and certain techniques of textured presentation in the piano part also refer us to the works of the German composer. However, this is hardly a conscious reliance on the achievements of J. Brahms, because the creative process of the two musicians took place in parallel, and A. Maier’s Violin Sonata appeared even a little earlier than similar works by J. Brahms in this genre. Prospects for further research in this direction relate to the search for new information about A. Maier’s life and creativity and the detailed examination of her other works.

В статье рассмотрены два предмета из Сибирской коллекции Краковского этнографического музея – женская шуба из оленьего меха и шапка из шкуры росомахи. В ходе исследования удалось выяснить имя дарителя – Исидора-Александра Собанского, сосланного в Сибирь участника Польского восстания 1863 г. Была обнаружена не известная ранее специалистам литография русского художника В.Д. Сверчкова, изображающая, в частности, женскую шапку и шубу, схожие с рассматриваемыми предметами из собрания Собанского. Установлено, что шапки из шкур росомахи были повседневным головным убором ненецких женщин на всем пространстве расселения этого этноса. Иногда такие шапки носили шаманы. Кроме того, сегодня известно, что женские шубы, аналогичные тем, что носили ненцы Канинского п-ова, до начала XX в. бытовали также в Приуралье и в низовьях Оби, куда их привозили из-за Урала невесты. В статье также затронуты малоизученные темы польских ссыльных в Западной Сибири и изображения ненцев в работах русских и зарубежных художников. Благодаря ссыльным, вернувшимся на родину из Сибири, в Польшу попали предметы, составившие основу Сибирской коллекции музея. Она насчитывает более 350 экспонатов, среди которых одежда, обувь, головные уборы, изделия из бересты, меха, кожи и костей животных. Почти все вещи были изготовлены в XIX в. разными народами Севера и Сибири – ненцами, селькупами, эвенками, эвенами, чукчами, коряками, алеутами. Two objects from the Siberian collection of the Krakow Ethnographic Museum are discussed in the article – a women’s fur coat from deer fur and a hat from wolverine skin. In the course of the study, the name of the donor was found out – Isidor-Alexander Sobansky, a Polish rebel of 1863, exiled to Siberia. A previously unknown to specialists lithography by the Russian artist Vladimir Sverchkov was discovered; it depicts a woman’s hat and a fur coat similar to objects from the Sobansky collection. It is known that hats from wolverine skins were part of everyday clothes of Nenets women throughout the territory of the Nenets settlement. Sometimes they were worn by shamans. The article proves that until the beginning of the 20th century women’s fur coats of the Nenets of the Kaninsky peninsula were also worn in the Urals and in the lower Ob, having been brought there by brides. In addition, the article touches on poorly studied topics of the Polish exile in Western Siberia and the depiction of the Nenets in the works of Russian and foreign artists. Thanks to the exiles who returned to their homeland from Siberia, the items that formed the basis of the Siberian collection came to Poland. The collection contains more than 350 items, including clothing, footwear, hats, products from birch bark, fur, leather and animal bones. Almost all of them were made in the 19th century by different peoples of the North and Siberia – Nenets, Selkups, Evenks, Evens, Chukchi, Koryaks, Aleuts.

Nowadays, not all women can make themselves up properly and perfectly to attend an important event, so they need Makeup Artist (MUA) services. Supported by technological advances where consumers are starting to leave the traditional way of finding MUA from salons near their homes whose quality is unknown, so MUA services platforms exist. The number of MUAs spread across Indonesia has reached 500,000. The large business opportunity as MUA in Indonesia means that MUAs must be able to maintain their business in the face of competition because consumers have many considerations in choosing and buying services. On the other hand, MUA still has difficulty getting consumers and the MUA services still does not know about the consumer purchase decision. The purpose of this study is to determine consumer purchasing decisions for MUA services, factors that influence the purchasing decision for the MUA services, and marketing communications that are suitable for the consumer purchase decision. The data analyzed with a mix method, qualitatively and quantitatively. Qualitative methods are used in-depth interviews with coding and quantitative methods by distributing questionnaires online using SmartPLS 3.0. The results of qualitative analysis from the informant’s explanation divided into eight subjects, there are reasons for using MUA service, need fulfillment, specific time, source of information, consideration when choose MUA services, MUA services comparison, customer satisfaction, and considerations when choose MUA services platform. The research of quantitative analysis reveals that perceived risk, sales promotion and direct marketing have a negative significant relationship on purchase decision, whereas tie strength and involvement have a positive significant relationship on WOM influence. Meanwhile, WOM influence and advertising have a positive significant relationship on purchase decision for MUA services. The findings of this study give recommendations to MUA services to focus on advertising, provide review features, and create attractive portfolios.

The author published different short studies and stories about József Rippl-Rónai’s biography and his works. An obscure document was also published about the origin of his house which known in Kaposvár as Róma villa. It is the first time to compile Lazarine’s biography, French-born wife of the painter in which her tapestry of artistic activities was reviewed. Due to the modern style innovations, „Fifty draw-ings” titled and published by Rippl-Rónai in 1913 was also reported. In these studies, the English Fenella Lowell ap-peared as a model, who inspired nude women oil-paintings of Rippl-Rónai. An unknown letter from Rippl-Rónai’s daughter, the German-born Amélie Feigl was documented. An Rippl-Rónai’s counterfeiting pastel was storied which was hap-pened at the end of the artist’s life (1927) during his illness.

This thesis proposes to analyze the dichotomous representation of the female model as benevolent and malevolent in three 19th-century French novels. Honoré de Balzacâ s The Unknown Masterpiece (1834), Jules and Edmond de Goncourtâ s Manette Salomon (1867), and à mile Zolaâ s The Masterpiece (1886) are all novels set in artistâ s workshops and all portray the female model as playing an essential role in determining the success, then demise of the male painter. My study of these texts will therefore focus on the juxtaposed presentations of the female models in terms of their relationships to the male artists. It will reveal how as the artists succeed in transforming their modelsâ bodies into aesthetic nudes and containing these representations within the parameters of their canvases as a means of asserting their authority, the models are positively portrayed. On the contrary, when the artists fail to transform and contain their modelsâ bodies, these female characters are negatively depicted as being the source of the paintersâ ruin. By examining this dichotomous representation of the female models, I will reveal the complex means by which the patriarchal order within the texts oppresses the female characters.
Master of Arts

When women don’t have access to public voices, their stories may be told through symbols and sewing, publicly viewed but understood only by an audience of intimates. My research builds upon my May 2016 residency in Assisi, Italy, and explores description through absence. Punto Assisi, an embroidery tradition predating the Renaissance, is still practised by women of Assisi. Uniquely, the subject matter is empty of detail. The negative space in Punto Assisi work can be seen as echoing the absence of information about the makers. Invisible and indispensable, women and their work have provided the fabric of human society throughout history, yet the names and faces of female artists and artisans are rarely documented. This embroidery style resonated with my interest in women's work and how ubiquitous and anonymous it is. Based on the concept of drawing with thread to manifest content, I explore description through absence, and honour the unknown makers of this art. Studio practice revealed insight into materiality, imagery, form design and palette. The haptic process of sewing gave insight into a universality of the experience of making, a connection crossing time, place and culture. The experience of the maker is highly individual and takes place in diverse contexts. The maker and their experience may be unknown, except to self, however the outcome, the product or the artwork may be indexical of a place, time or the maker, known or unknown. As such, unknown women makers have a presence in their works. The negative space in the uncoloured linen yields a presence and materiality that allows us to engage with what isn’t there. Absence is made material. Materiality, memory, narrative, and identity are themes emerging from this project. In my contemporary application of the style constraints yielded creative freedom. In absence, I found description.
Master of Arts (Visual and Performing Arts) (Research)

This chapter examines Yung Vilne (Young Vilna, 1929–1940). In the decade preceding the outbreak of the Second World War, a group of young, unknown Yiddish poets, writers, and artists helped turn Vilna into the dominant Yiddish cultural centre in Poland. These young men and women, the majority of them from Vilna itself or its neighbouring towns, emerged at a moment when Jewish Vilna's culture was defined by its commitment to Yiddish culture and youth. Drawn together under the rubric Yung Vilne, the group synthesized the aspirations of individual members for artistic experimentation and freedom of expression with a collective concern for the social, political, and cultural life of the city. In doing so, Yung Vilne earned the distinction of being both the last of the major Yiddish avant-garde movements in inter-war Poland, and the literary group most evocative of the pressures of time and place.

The ruined city known locally as Salhiyeh was virtually unknown to western scholarship until the twentieth century (Sarre and Herzfeld 1920, 386–95; Kaizer 2017, 64), but its ancient identity remained unknown until the aftermath of the World War I when collapse of the Ottoman empire saw Britain and France divide up much of the Middle East between them (Velud 1988; Barr 2011). As we saw, during operations against Arabs resisting the new western occupation, British-commanded Indian troops bivouacking at the site dug defensive positions and accidentally revealed wall paintings. These were seen and published by visiting American archaeologist James Henry Breasted (Breasted 1922; 1924), who first identified the ruins as those of the historically attested but unlocated ‘Dura . . . called Europos by the Greeks’ (Isidore of Charax, Parthian Stations, 1). The site thereafter fell inside the newly imposed borders of French-controlled Syria (Velud 1988). More substantial excavations were conducted and published with exemplary speed by Franz Cumont in 1922–3 (Cumont 1926), paving the way for the great Yale University/French Academy expedition overseen by Mikhail Rostovtzeff. This ran over ten seasons: (Dates from the Preliminary Reports, and Hopkins 1979, xxii–xxiv, except ninth and tenth seasons from information in Yale archives provided by Megan Doyon and Richard A. Grossmann.) With a Roman military presence attested from the outset, further traces were encountered throughout the city’s exploration, with the heart of the military base area being identified and excavated in the fifth season, and the great ‘Palace of the dux ripae’ in the ninth. While masterminded by Rostovtzeff, and more nominally Cumont, these giants actually only briefly visited the excavations on a couple of occasions. The dig was conducted under a series of field directors: Maurice Pillet, Clark Hopkins, and finally Frank Brown. These led a small team of American and European architects, artists, and archaeologists, mostly male (although women occupied prominent places on the team, including Yale graduate student Margaret Crosby and most notably Hopkins’s wife Susan); they were mostly young and inexperienced (including Hopkins and Brown).

In this chapter, I investigate the networks of women writers associated with Chambers’s Edinburgh Journal through an analysis of its ledgers and correspondence files. I detail their contributions, writing locations, rates of remuneration and working relationships with the editorial staff in order to shed light on the role Chambers’s played in the emergence of the popular woman writer in the early decades of the Victorian era. I link the work of individual writers to the editorial policies and generic conventions of the journal, which constructed ‘modern’ women as key players in the popular literature movement, both as readers and writers. Chambers’s provided a venue for prominent women writers such as Anna Maria Hall to reach broader audiences than ever before and for up-and-coming authors, such as Dinah Mulock and Julia Kavanagh, to establish themselves in a burgeoning literary marketplace. Chambers’s also provided opportunities for many other amateur and unknown authors to pursue their craft anonymously without name or fame. Written in part by and for women, Chambers’s Journal, by the 1850s, became an important vehicle for debates on the ‘Woman Question’, bringing issues of female education and employment to a broad audience of artisan and middle-class readers.

The attention of visitors to National Gallery in London is attracted to the image of a naked woman whose unnaturally positioned body, painted in white hue of cold, metallic glow, fills up the field of the picture (photo 1). The multiplicity of props and figures in the background, including different allegorical topics, mythological allusions, so jointly it creates a complex image, which is difficult to interpret unambiguously. The author of this intriguing work is Agnolo di Cosimo di Mariano, known as Agnolo Bronzino (1503–1572). Exhibitions presenting his achievements, undertaken after the year 2010, revived the discussions on the legacy of one of the greatest Italian 16th century artists of unusually rich, unfettered imagination. Agnolo Bronzino’s successes attracted the attention of Cosimo I the Medici and his wife Eleanor of Toledo, for whom he started working in 1540. On their commission, between 1540–1545 he made a painting that has been surprising until today and one of the most famous ones in the European art, the pride of the National Gallery in London. The work was designed for a diplomatic gift for the ruler of France, king Francois I. What is surprising in the painting, except many enigmatic figures, is the nudity of the goddess Venus, her unreal, metallic color, the smooth surface of her body, resembling enamel or china. Unfortunately, the reports concerning reception of the painting on the French court are unknown, but we can suppose that the king liked it, because it became his strictly private property.