Abstract

As has long been recognised, self-portraiture – both in autonomous and historiated self portraits – plays an important role in the work of most early modern women artists. What has been much less noted is the fact that the vast majority of female self-portraits show their makers at a very young age. The general tendency has been to interpret these works as part of their authors’ self-promotion as artists in a field dominated by men, thus implying that they conceived and produced them in complete autonomy. The aim of this paper is to propose a change of perspective, trying to show that the phenomenon of female self-portraiture rather responded to the expectations of the public. Both the high number of women’s self-portraits and their characteristics – the sitters’ young age and the frequent adoption of the typology of the artist at work – can in fact be explained by the special interest in the rare spectacle of women painters. The essay argues therefore that its production was essentially fuelled by the demand of collectors for such works and often determined and controlled by the entourage of the artists, especially their fathers.