Sofonisba Anguissola, also known as Sophonisba Angussola or Sophonisba Anguisciola, was an Italian Renaissance painter born in Cremona to a relatively poor noble family. She received a well-rounded education that included the fine arts, and her apprenticeship with local painters set a precedent for women to be accepted as students of art. As a young woman, Anguissola traveled to Rome where she was introduced to Michelangelo, who immediately recognized her talent, and to Milan, where she painted the Duke of Alba. The Spanish queen, Elizabeth of Valois, was a keen amateur painter and in 1559 Anguissola was recruited to go to Madrid as her tutor, with the rank of lady-in-waiting. She later became an official court painter to the king, Philip II, and adapted her style to the more formal requirements of official portraits for the Spanish court. After the queen's death, Philip helped arrange an aristocratic marriage for her. She moved to Sicily, and later Pisa and Genoa, where she continued to practice as a leading portrait painter.
Ferrara is a city and comune (municipality) in Emilia-Romagna, Northern Italy, capital of the province of Ferrara. As of 2016, it had 132,009 inhabitants. It is situated 44 kilometres northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main stream of the Po River, located 5 km north. The town has broad streets and numerous palaces dating from the Renaissance, when it hosted the court of the House of Este. For its beauty and cultural importance, it has been designated by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site.
Lucia Anguissola was an Italian Mannerist painter of the late Renaissance. Born in Cremona, Italy, she was the third daughter among the seven children of Amilcare Anguissola and Bianca Ponzoni. Her father was a member of the Genoese minor nobility and encouraged his five daughters to develop artistic skills alongside their humanist education. Lucia most likely trained with her renowned eldest sister Sofonisba Anguissola. Her paintings, mainly portraits, are similar in style and technique to those of her sister. Contemporary critics considered her skill exemplary; according to seventeenth-century biographer Filippo Baldinucci, Lucia had the potential to "become a better artist than even Sofonisba" had she not died so young.
Elena Anguissola was an Italian painter and nun. She was the sister of the better-known painter Sofonisba Anguissola.
Self-Portrait at a Spinet is an oil-on-canvas painting by the Italian artist Sofonisba Anguissola, from c. 1555. It is held in the National Museum of Capodimonte, in Naples.
Portrait of Paolo Morigia is a 1592–1595 oil on canvas painting by Fede Galizia, painted for the church of San Gerolamo in Milan and donated in 1670 to the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana in the same city, where it still hangs.
The Chess Game is a painting of c. 1530 by Giulio Campi, a Renaissance painter from Cremona. Since 1970, it has been in the Museo Civico d'Arte Antica in Turin.
The Portrait of Elena Anguissola, dated to 1551, is one of the earliest paintings by Sofonisba Anguissola. An oil painting on canvas, it is in the Southampton City Art Gallery, which acquired it in 1936.
The Child Bitten by A Lobster is a drawing by the Italian painter Sofonisba Anguissola, executed in chalk and pencil on light blue paper, and dated to around 1554. It is in the collection of the Museo di Capodimonte, in Naples.
The Game of Chess is an oil-on-canvas painting executed ca. 1555 by Italian Renaissance artist Sofonisba Anguissola. Anguissola was 23 years old when she painted it.
The Portrait of Giovanni Battista Caselli is a half-length portrait executed by the Italian sixteenth-century artist Sofonisba Anguissola. Caselli was a poet from Cremona, the same city as the Anguissola. Executed in 1559, it was one of her last paintings before departing to the royal court of Spain, where she would become official painter to the queen of Spain, Isabel de Valois.
Anna Maria Anguissola was a 16th-century Italian painter born in Cremona, Italy.
Self-portrait at an Easel is an oil-on-canvas painting created c. 1556–1565 by the Italian Renaissance painter Sofonisba Anguissola, now in Łańcut Castle. From the same era as Self-Portrait at a Spinet (Naples) it shows the artist painting a devotional canvas and is one of a group of self-portraits which also includes Self-Portrait (Vienna) and Miniature Self Portrait (Boston).
Portrait of Minerva Anguissola is a c. 1564 oil-on-canvas painting by the Italian painter Sofonisba Anguissola, now in the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan.
Portrait of Elisabeth of Valois is an oil-on-canvas painting executed c.1561–1565 by the Italian artist Sofonisba Anguissola, now in the Museo del Prado in Madrid.
Portrait of Bianca Ponzoni Anguissola or Lady in White is an oil-on canvas-painting created in 1557 by the Italian Renaissance painter Sofonisba Anguissola. It is a portrait of the artist's mother. It is now in the Gemäldegalerie, Berlin. It is securely identified as the artist's mother, since it reuses two elements from The Game of Chess, Lucia's pearl headdress and Minerva/Elena's necklace Under the arm of the chair are the signature and date "Sophonisba Angussola Virgo F. 15.5.7".
Portrait of Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia is a 1599 oil-on-canvas painting of Isabella Clara Eugenia by the Italian painter Sofonisba Anguissola, identified in 1992 by Maria Kusche. Owned by the Museo del Prado, it currently hangs in the Spanish Embassy in Paris.
Portrait of Massimiliano II Stampa is a c.1558 oil-on-canvas painting by the Italian Renaissance painter Sofonisba Anguissola, now in the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, USA. It was previously misattributed to Giovan Battista Moroni, possibly due to stylistic similarities with Moroni's The Knight in Black.
Self-Portrait Aged 71 is an 1862 oil-on-canvas painting by the Italian artist Francesco Hayez. The Uffizi had been requesting a self-portrait from him since 1858 via Andrea Appiani's daughter-in-law Giuseppina Appiani Strigelli and it finally arrived in 1863. It is still in the Uffizi's Vasari Corridor.
Maria Kusche was a Spanish art historian of German descent, a specialist on painters at the royal court of Philip II of Spain, in particular Sofonisba Anguissola, Juan Pantoja de la Cruz, and Alonso Sánchez Coello.
