A World of Our Own

Rating:
Summary: More Than Information
Review: The New York reviewer makes a good point but it's not ALL quotes.The book is also pretty informative about the career options open to women in the past and how they made use of them. The author takes a level-headed view and makes you feel admiring of the way women have been getting on with the job of being artists for hundreds of years. There's some stimulating pages at the end about the role of feminism as well.

Rating:
Summary: Women Talk About Their Art
Review: The surprise about this book is the number of quotes from women artists themselves, not just from the l9th and 20th century, but from earlier centuries too. In the l6th century Sophonisba Anguissola's father thanks Michaelangelo for helping improve his daughter's drawing. In the l7th century, Artemisia Gentileschi says "I will show my lord, what a woman artist can do." In the l8th century, Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun recalls her technique for making the most of the looks of the women she painted. The author shows how for 500 years women have made up a sigificant minority of the community of working artists. The book is lavishly illustrated with rarely seen images of women artists at work and of the paintings and sculptures they produced. This book would make a wonderful present!