Dia de la mujer: en el arte

For International Women’s Day, I want to tell you a little story that I just wrote my art history paper on. 

This is Judith Slaying Holofernes by Artemisia Gentileschi. It depicts the violence of two women decapitating Holofernes’ head (one of the general’s of the King Nebuchadnezzar’s army). Gentileschi is known for painting scenes during the 17th century Baroque movement that illustrated violence towards men. This is because whenever she was 18, she claimed to have been raped by one of her father’s colleagues at the university she studied art at. When she spoke out against him, the man went through trial but was never punished for his actions. Judith Slaying Holofernes is a story portrayed in the bible. At the time, the Assyrian army was about to destroy the town of Bethulia. Judith had snuck into his tent late at night with her maidservant, seduced him, got him drunk, and decapitated his head when he passed out. The next day, she had hung his head on the gates to the city showing that the entire Assyrian army couldn’t go further because of their dead general. Because of this action, Judith was seen as the city’s heroine. Gentileschi’s characteristics in this painting are shown to be very forceful and violent. She is telling this story out of anger through her experiences with men. To the audience, it shows that women (even religious ones) can be a lot more than what men can expect from them, and nothing is stopping them to get justice. And if you don’t think that is not just the most badass thing you’ve heard all day then I don’t know what is.