Artemisia Gentileschi
Tensions and Enthusiasm
trigger warning: sexual violence
This article was written in Italian by our co-founder Sara and translated in English. If you’d like to view the original piece click here.
If you follow us on social media or are our friend, then you know that amongst the fuses lit the last few months, fire sparked around one name: Artemisia Gentileschi. In light of the closing of the problematic exhibition dedicated to the artist, we're not taking a sigh of relief and instead want to keep the fire burning, diving deeper into the tensions and passions that have surrounded this journey.
In case you missed it, the exhibition we’re referring to is ‘Artemisia Gentileschi, Courage and Passion’, promoted and organized by the private entity Arthemisia together with the public institution Palazzo Ducale Genova, and curated by Costantino D’Orazio in collaboration with Anna Orlando. Unveiled on November 16th, 2023, it closes today, April 1st, 2024.
The beginning
A few days after the exhibition’s opening, Noemi Tarantini (@etantebellecose on social media) gets contacted by Valentina Cervella e Carolina Dos Santos Guerreiro, two art history students at the University of Genova worried about the violent narration that permeates the gallery. Tarantini meets with the students, visits the exhibit, and posts this video on Instagram (for our non-Italian speakers, you can find the English explanation here).
Pasted below are multiple anonymous testimonies of those who’ve visited the exhibition, which may help gather just how problematic it is. A portfolio of mostly men, gruesome wall texts that go on and on about the violence endured by Gentileschi, the work of the artist placed next to that her abuser Tassi, an unavoidable immersive room with no trigger warning now dubbed as ‘rape room’ which displays the bed where the artist was abused, horrifying merch like the t-shirt with the self-absolving phrase pronounced by Tassi, and finally the book ‘At Night You Drive Me Crazy: Erotic Acts of Agostino Tassi, Painter’ by Pietrangelo Buttafuoco (appointed as President of the 2024 Biennale by the Meloni government).
The actions
We'd like to take a moment to express our immense gratitude to the art history students who kickstarted this important civic engagement process. Their call has been embraced by professionals and activist organizations from Genova and beyond, coming together to establish a collective dedicated to challenging this narrative by crafting a polyphonic counter-narrative. The organisations NUDM Genova, together with MiRiconosci Beni Culturali, and About Gender, the artist Simona Barbera, the art sharers and professionals Noemi Tarantini and Valentina Crifò, and the art historian Amina Gaia Abdelouahab wrote and were among the first signatories of an open letter. In it, the demands are concrete and essential, aimed at making the exhibition more accessible and addressing the sensationalizing of the violence experienced by Gentileschi. Essential, yes, we underline. Because it would have been just as appropriate to ask for the detachment of the artistic opus of the painter by that of her abuser.
Sara, co-writer of this article, joins the group the day of the publication of the open letter. After having seen (and endured) herself the exhibition. Ginevra also joins, seeking to amplify the work of the activists and professionals outside of national borders.
The questions and perplexities that arise from this matter get thoroughly discussed in two events open to the public, during a plethora of counterpoints to the narration are brought forward. Stage of these meetings is the Sala Campana of the Tosse Theatre in Genova.
The video of the second event on the 16th of March is available here (Italian only, sorry!)
Establishing a dialogue between institutions and society must include both sides’ willingness to navigate through tensions and critiques. The first step should be the an open and reciprocal dialogue. In January, the collective was invited to a guided tour of the exhibition by D’Orazio (the curator) and, in return, he attended a public assembly held by NUDM on 13th of the same month. What results from the exchange is an attempt by Palazzo Ducale to listen to the demands of an important part of its demographic. Ducale then tries to change the exhibition setup, but enters into a conflict with Arthemisia. Giuseppe Costa, president of the Palazzo Ducale Foundation, announces:
“We will change our contracts with exhibition producers, Palazzo Ducale must be more involved in these processes: we’re also cultural mediators and sit between producers of culture and the public, if the public manifests disdain we must answer, and in this case we weren’t able to do enough”.
This willingness to rethink institutional practices is fundamentally important, but even more important is the acknowledgement of rights to cultural participation of citizens. “If the public manifests disdain, we must answer” Costa says, as among the duties of the Foundation are clearly stated: rights to citizen participation, the importance of engagement with the community, and the encouraging of the right to culture.
Not just an exhibition
Zooming back out and looking at the general context, the period of neoliberal restructuring of Western societies was marked by what is known as cognitive capitalism, aka the economisation and the systematization of education and culture. Both universities and cultural institutions became tools for power and control. Borrowing from the words of art historian Borja-Villel, museums gained a “certain centrality due to political and economical power, which leverages on their cultural prestige and media influence to mask, embellish, or legitimize their operations”1.
In this context, there is a reiteration of a static, colonial, and patriarchal narration of cultural heritage which has cast a sacred veil over art, rendering it untouchable, unattainable, illuminating and therefore elitist, not for everyone.
In a critical view of the institution, this time borrowing from artist Andrea Fraser, thinking that institutions exist independently of us removes our sense of responsibility. We are the institution2. We have the power to choose what institutions we want to amplify and represent us. This is what we mean by saying that engaging in art and activism on the steps of cultural public spaces embodies both participation and responsibility.
If culture is a right, then it mustn’t be diminished to a good, merch. The right to culture, recognised in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, develops through three different dimensions that must be granted by the institutions: consumption, production, and participation in cultural life.
“Participation is the fulcrum around which contemporary cultural concepts and public policies orbit. A participation that implies seriously considering the actual contribution of citizens, not only in terms of consumption and enjoyment, but also of real and concrete contribution to artistic and cultural management and production3”.
I know we just threw a lot of information at you but we think it’s important to detangle these intricacies. When the fundamental work of activists and professionals gets laughed off and minimized by those who represent the institution, pardon our French, it pisses us off.
A few days after the counter-narration meeting open to the public, Valentina Crifò from Immagini Narranti, shares in our activist group a message received in private (and that we have permission to share here). Alice Boeri, president of the association IoTuNoiVoi - Women together Anti-violence Centre, art enthusiast attending a retrospective on Gentileschi, and someone who’s been closely following the events, writes:
“Yesterday I attended a conference by Costantino D’Orazio titled Family Violence: Artemisia, Agostino e Orazio, held in Udine at the Giovanni da Udine theatre as part of the lecture series History Lessons which this year follows the theme of ‘war of the sexes’. The lecture series has been very successful and always fills up the theatre. I felt the need to let you know that during the lecture, Orazio, not particularly subtly, belittled the protests that arose against the exhibition, painting the ‘feminists from Genova’ as blind contrarians that didn’t really get it […]”
Here we are, feminists from Genova that didn’t really get it. I hope it’s clear by now that we’re not a group of silly incompetents, it would be embarrassing to believe otherwise. The network we’ve built is so engaged and strong that we’re even receiving support and care all the way from Udine, where others like us are committed to reclaiming these narratives.
If the anonymous testimonies from traumatic experiences from the exhibition, the numbers we’ve reached during our deep dives on various social media platforms, the participation to our meetings and the media interest both nationally and internationally aren’t enough to prove that we’re not just ‘feminists from Genova’ throwing a tantrum, maybe we need mention that protests against the narratives and political positioning of institutional and cultural centers is a recurring global phenomenon.
The occupation of the MoMA and the gathering on the steps of the Brooklyn Museum, followed by an open letter in which activists and museum workers challenge the institutions' silence on the ongoing genocide against the Palestinian population. Pro-Palestine and climate change protests that led the British Museum to close its doors to the public for a day. Most recently, a demonstration at the MET featuring a beautiful textile quilt calling for Palestinian liberation. These are just a few examples. Cultural institutions don’t always represent us, and we acknowledge that. However, we also know that it is our right and responsibility to envision alternative ways to reclaim art and its narratives, to see ourselves represented in its diverse reflections.
This struggle is not just personal. It’s not about Palazzo Ducale or Costantino D’Orazio and even less about Iole Siena. It’s a broader issue that includes the entire cultural landscape. But, because the personal is political, we carry it in our homes, seeking representation So if you want your gallery rooms to be alive and flowing with enriching ideas, listen to who’s sitting on the steps of your cultural spaces.
And if this still isn’t enough, you can access the anonymous testimonies of those who’ve attended the exhibition. But please only open if you’re in the mental space to.
After rage we must regain enthusiasm, for ourselves. This experience has opened the doors to new paths, create new webs, gather around new fires. The strength and love that have been part of this process can’t be put into words, but those who’ve been involved (even minimally) will hopefully carry them forever. Together we can move mountains.
Borja-Villel, M. (2010). ¿Pueden los museos ser críticos? Carta N°1, [Can Museums be Critical? Letter N° 1] (Spring 2010). (1 - 2). Available at: https://www.elboomeran.com/upload/ficheros/noticias/carta_editorial.pdf
Fraser, A. (2005). From the Critique of Institutions to the Institution of Critique. Artforum. Vol. 44, n°1. (September, 2005) pp. 78 - 83. Available at: https://www.artforum.com/print/200507/from-the-critique-of-institutions-to-´33an-institution-of-critique-9407
Carbò G. (2022). Cultura para la vida. [Culture for life]. Niña Carasso Foundation. Available at: https://www.fondationcarasso.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Cultura-para-la-Vida_Fundacion-Carasso-FINAL.pdf