Boom time for female Old Masters: Demand is soaring and Gentileschi has become a household name — and many more are waiting to step into the spotlight

“I still get goosebumps thinking back to that day,” says Palmyre Manivet, associate director at art restorers Simon Gillespie Studio, recalling the moment in 2018 that a colleague uncovered the signature of 17th-century artist Artemisia Gentileschi on a painting of David and Goliath. The thrill Manivet felt reverberated across the art world: a new Gentileschi had been attributed. Dealers, galleries and auction houses must have been delighted too, since the market for female Old Masters has been booming like never before. Gentileschi set a record price of $5.3mn in 2019.

 

For centuries, women who were feted by their contemporaries were dismissed after their deaths by art historians, victims of pervasive institutional and societal misogyny. Academic interest in female artists started surging in the 1970s, but auction houses date the market’s rise to around 2017, driven in part by having more women in positions of power in the art world, as well as the #MeToo movement shaking up staid attitudes.

 

There has been a concerted effort to broaden art holdings, says Calvine Harvey, vice-president at Sotheby’s in New York. “I think everyone, museums and private collectors alike, took a step back and thought about their collections and realised how important it was to make sure they had a diverse collection.”