Plautilla Nelli, Lamentation with Saints, XVI century, San Marco Museum
Plautilla Nelli’s Lamentation with Saints
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The artwork that started it all. AWA founder Jane Fortune describes the painting behind the founding of Advancing Women Artists: “Nelli’s Lamentation with Saints graces the large refectory of the San Marco Museum. Her most famous public work, it expresses the raw emotional grief surrounding Christ’s death, as depicted through the red eyes and visible tears of its female figures. When, in 2006, when I funded its restoration, in collaboration with The Florence Committee of NMWA, I found it amazing to witness the painting’s surface, turned dull and lackluster with the passage of time, transformed into a brilliant, vibrant image with astoundingly rare emotional power. This self-taught master continues to evoke feelings of compassion that linger long after one views the painting. As the colors of Lamentation with Saints sprang forth and the uniqueness of Suor Plautilla Nelli’s painterly hand became increasingly visible, questions began to form in my mind and tug at my heart. ‘Where are Suor Plautilla Nelli’s other works today? I wondered, And if discovered, do they need restoration as well?’”
Text from Jane Fortune’s Invisible Women Forgotten Artists of Florence.
Text from Jane Fortune’s Invisible Women Forgotten Artists of Florence.