Women's Legacies in Natural Studies, Health, and Liberal Arts

In the last few decades, the study of women in the arts has largely increased in terms of scholars involved in research and investigation, with the reception of the outcomes especially acknowledged by museums which are dedicating part of their mission to organizing exhibitions and/or acquiring the works of women. The Annual International Women in Arts Conference seeks to advance contemporary discussions on how the female genius has helped shape European culture in its heterogeneity since the Middle Ages. This volume collects the proceedings of the first conference organised in Rome, in October 2021. It focuses on the role of women in literature and manuscript illumination, and architecture. Throughout history, these domains were often seen as very masculine. Yet, there have been many women who have made their mark as writers, illuminators and architects, or have played a decisive role as patrons and supporters in these arts. This collection of essays aims to bring these women to the fore, and sheds a new light on the heritage and legacy of women in literature and architecture from the Middle Ages until the end of the 18th century. Special attention is given to contemporary discussions of Gender Digital Humanities and how new digital tools can advance the field of cultural heritage.

Teodoro De Giorgio, The ‘lux vivens’ and Hildegard’s New Senses: Tools for Knowledge of God and Nature
Patricia Rocco, A Gendered Nature: Women and Naturalism in Early Modern Bologna
Stefania Biancani, Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun e la malattia dell’artista
Marie Vymazalová, Women-founders of Prague Loreto in the context of the iconographic motive of the miraculous Nativity according to St. Bridget of Sweden
Leah Tharpe, Elizabeth Gould, ‘The Queen of All Naturalists’
Loretta Vandi, ‘Uccellami e fiorami’ for History and Poetry in Grand Ducal Florence: The Naturalistic Drawings of Suor Maria Benigna Cavalcanti (Convent of Le Murate) and Suor Caterina Angelica della Vacchia (Convent of Santa Chiara)
Alba Carballeira, Neroli, the Essence of Princesse des Ursins’ Legacy: The Blooming of a Legend
Anna Kopócsy, Today’s Madonnas: The Image of Motherhood as Depicted by Hungarian Female Painters in Interwar Art
Juliet Simpson, Unseen Modernities: Re‑imagining the Visionary ‘Real’ in the Art of Marianne Stokes, 1880s‑1910s
Adelina Modesti, Some Thoughts on Women, Art, Nature, Science: Female Pioneers in Still Life, Botanical Painting, and Scientific Illustratio