These days, anyone with even a passing interest in old master art knows about Artemisia Gentileschi (1593–1652), one of the very few women to become, against all odds, an acclaimed painter at a time when making art was an exclusively male province. Born in 1593 and motherless from the age of twelve, she grew up in the heart of Rome, in the studio of her painter father Orazio (1563– 1639), apparently taught by him and displaying precocious talent. When she was seventeen, one of her father’s friends and collaborators, a painter specializing in landscape and illusionistic architecture, raped her, promised to marry her, but conveniently neglected to tell her until much later that his supposedly dead wife was, in fact, very much alive. A complicated, protracted, and now much-discussed trial followed, replete with false witnesses, counter-accusations, and even torture. The rapist was found guilty and sentenced to exile, although he didn’t bother to leave Rome until he was convicted of some other offense a few years later. To save face, Artemisia was married off to an undistinguished Florentine painter, and she soon moved to Florence.

Astonishingly, she went on to establish herself as an artist to be reckoned with, gaining the support of the Medici as patrons and becoming the first female member of the Accademia del Disegno. She became part of the circle of the Medici court poet and a close friend of Galileo’s—despite being virtually illiterate. Her success notwithstanding, Artemisia left Florence abruptly in 1620 and