New Renaissance: how Florence is freeing its great female artists

From The Guardian:

Rossella Lari restores The Last Supper by Plautilla Nelli.

Ask most people to name a female artist, and chances are they will come up with a contemporary figure: Tracey Emin, Rachel Whiteread or Paula Rego. Or they’ll name a 20th-century artist such as Frida Kahlo, or Georgia O’Keeffe. What they won’t do, though, is name one of the 16th- or 17th-century women who painted during and in the years following the Renaissance. Nelli is one of many female artists – including Artemisia Gentileschi, one of the most accomplished followers of Caravaggio, and Marietta Robusti who learned from her father Tintoretto – that history has unfairly neglected.

Now, though – nearly half a millennium on – that is beginning to change. AWA, which was established in 2009 by US philanthropist Jane Fortune, is committed to rediscovering all the works by women that lie forgotten in the museum attics and churches of Florence: at least 2,000 so far. When a painting is found, crowdfunding and special appeals pay for its restoration.

read more here @ The Guardian and here @ AWA (Advancing Women Artists)