Dernière sortie
La Pittura
Rome, 1612. Artemisia Gentileschi has already learned that justice and consequence are rarely the same thing. At eighteen she is an extraordinarily gifted painter, working in a world where talent matters, but so do money, reputation and the approval of powerful men. Following the notorious trial of Agostino Tassi, Artemisia leaves Rome for Florence and begins the difficult business of becoming known for what she does rather than what was done to her.
But La Pittura imagines another story running beneath the one history has preserved. When Artemisia becomes involved in the death of a man, she and her confidante Lucia are drawn into a dangerous hidden world of women for whom the respectable routes to justice have failed. What begins almost by accident follows Artemisia through the increasingly successful years of her career, as the distance between justice and vengeance becomes harder to judge.
And someone is watching. Cesare is witty, curious and an irritatingly perceptive admirer of Artemisia's work. He sees things in her paintings that others overlook, then begins to notice things beyond the canvas too. Across the workshops, palaces and streets of seventeenth-century Italy, seemingly unrelated events begin to form a pattern. Drawing on the remarkable real life and paintings of Artemisia Gentileschi, La Pittura is a historical thriller of murder and intrigue, but also of ambition, friendship, family and the considerable difficulty of making a living from art.
At its heart is a woman too often remembered for what was done to her, rather than for everything she did afterwards. Because some masterpieces are born in darkness.
But La Pittura imagines another story running beneath the one history has preserved. When Artemisia becomes involved in the death of a man, she and her confidante Lucia are drawn into a dangerous hidden world of women for whom the respectable routes to justice have failed. What begins almost by accident follows Artemisia through the increasingly successful years of her career, as the distance between justice and vengeance becomes harder to judge.
And someone is watching. Cesare is witty, curious and an irritatingly perceptive admirer of Artemisia's work. He sees things in her paintings that others overlook, then begins to notice things beyond the canvas too. Across the workshops, palaces and streets of seventeenth-century Italy, seemingly unrelated events begin to form a pattern. Drawing on the remarkable real life and paintings of Artemisia Gentileschi, La Pittura is a historical thriller of murder and intrigue, but also of ambition, friendship, family and the considerable difficulty of making a living from art.
At its heart is a woman too often remembered for what was done to her, rather than for everything she did afterwards. Because some masterpieces are born in darkness.
