Paintings of Sofonisba Anguissola

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In the painting the nun wears a lily-white habit which stands out against the dark background. The red and gold bound book of prayers offers the only source of detail. The sitter is usually identified as Elena Anguissola, Sofonisba’s younger sister who had been a student of the painter Bernardino Campi along with Sofonisba, and later entered the monastery of San Vincenzo in Mantua assuming the name of Sister Minerva.

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That women could be intellectually accomplished and highly rational, even strategic, are the complementary themes of a family portrait showing Anguissola’s three sisters playing chess. In this painting, which Vasari saw hanging in the artist’s family home in Cremona in 1566, the chivalric game of chess takes place in an idealized landscape familiar in late medieval courtly images of the game and not in a tavern or other questionable locale seen in other contemporary representations of gaming. On the far left Lucia looks out at the viewer, dominating our gaze as her arm and obvious expertise dominate the chess board. She has removed two of Minerva’s pieces from the game and the younger sister opens her mouth and raises her hand as if to speak. […]

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