A ROYAL REDISCOVERY
ARTEMISIA GENTILESCHI'S SUSANNA AND THE ELDERS PAINTED FOR HENRIETTA MARIA
17.00 (BST) / 12.00 (EDT)
MONDAY 9 OCTOBER 2023
An exceptional opportunity to hear the story behind a newly attributed work by Artemisia Gentileschi from the academics and conservator who discovered it. Overlooked for centuries, the extraordinary woman painter is only in recent years getting due art historical acclaim. The National Gallery's 2020 exhibition positioned her not just as a superlative woman artist, but one of the stand-out masters of the Italian Baroque.
The Royal Collection Trust recently announced the rediscovery of a long-lost Susanna and the Elders by Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-c.1654 or after). Likely painted for Queen Henrietta Maria during the artist's stay at the English court, the work has been in the Royal Collection since 1639. It lost its attribution to Artemisia by the early nineteenth century and, much dirtied and worn by decades above fireplaces, was transferred to a picture store in the nineteenth century, where it remained, unidentified, until recently.
The Burlington Magazine has published an article on the discovery by Niko Munz and Adelaide Izat in its October issue and London Art Week is delighted to be able to introduce our audience to both of them in conversation with Letizia Treves, who curated the National Gallery exhibition on Artemisia, and Michael Hall, Editor of The Burlington Magazine.
Watch back the recording!
Nino Munz specialises in Northern Renaissance art. He was assistant curator at the Royal Collection Trust, where he worked on Charles I: King and Collector (2018). At the same time, he led the Stuart inventories digital republication project involving the search for lost Charles I artworks. He spent 2022 at the J. Paul Getty Museum. Having studied at the University of York and Cambridge University, Niko is currently Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow at the Freie Universität, Berlin. From October he will be Junior Research Fellow at Christ Church, Oxford.
Adelaide Izat is a paintings conservator, working at the Royal Collection Trust since 2001. Trained at the Hamilton Kerr Institute, University of Cambridge, she has worked on a wide range of paintings from 15th to 20th centuries, from Constable to Caravaggio and many in between. She collaborated on the technical entries of 147 paintings for the Later Flemish Paintings in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen, White, C., 2007. She has undertaken research on Titian and workshop variants. She forged groundbreaking solutions for the structural support of copper panels, using 3D scanning technology.
Letizia Treves
Letizia began her career in Old Master Paintings at Sotheby's in 1996, becoming worldwide specialist in Italian paintings. In 2013 she assumed the position of Curator of later Italian, Spanish and French 17th -century paintings at The National Gallery, London. Whilst there, she championed several acquisitions in her area and curated numerous exhibitions, including Beyond Caravaggio (2016) and Artemisia (2020). Letizia left the museum in 2022 and, after a period as Senior Partner at Moretti Fine Art in London, has recently taken on a new role as Global Head of
Research & Expertise in Old Masters at Christie's.
Michael Hall has been the Editor of The Burlington Magazine since 2017. He is the author of Art, Passion and Power: The Story of the Royal Collection (2017)'.
Follow the Royal Collection Trust and take a closer look at Artemisia Gentileschi's life and art.