<span style="color:white;">David: Of interest to me is the way society's traditional notions of what constitutes great art have either been modified or abandoned in order to create the illusion that woman are as good at art as men are.</span>
This is a fairly idiotic conclusion, since exactly the opposite is the case. Society's traditional notions of women's art were detrimental to the arts and to women. Artists with breasts were simply not recognized or tolerated by the patriarchy. For example, female painters in the late nineteenth century did not have the freedom to walk the streets, frequent the cafes, and live the life of a painter. Luckily this has changed.
<span style="color:white;">David: ...the question of why there are no great women artists...</span>
Some of the following artists would probably protest:
Caterina dei Vigri (1413-1463), Maria Ormani, Lucia Anguissola (c.1540-1565), Sofonisba Anguissola (1531-1626), Andriola de Baracchi, Sibylla de Bondorff, Suzanne de Court, Anna Cromenburch, Lavinia Fontana (1552-1614),Fede Galizia (1578-1630), Diana Scultori Ghisi (1547-1612), Caterina Hemessen (1527/8-c.1566), Esther Kello, aka Esther Inglis (1571-1624), Barbara Longhi (1552-1638), Properzia de' Rossi (1490-1530), Plautilla Nelli (1523-1588), Levina Teerline (c.1510-1576), Marietta Robusti Tintoretto (1560-1590), Caterina van Hemessen (c.1527-c.1566), Josefa de Ayala / de Óbidos (1630-1684), Mary Beale (1632-1697), Antoinette Bouzonnet-Stella (1641-1678), Plautilla Bricci (1616-c.1690), Orsola Maddalena Caccia, Elisabeth Sophie Chéron (1648-1711), Suzanne de Court, Lucrina Fetti, Giovanna Fratellini (166?-1731), Fede Galizia (1578-1630), Giovanna Garzoni (1600-1670), Artemesia Gentileschi (1593-1652), Anne Killigrew, and Lady Killigrew? (1660-1685), Judith Leyster (1609-1660), Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717), Louise Moillon (1610-1696), Clara Peeters (1589-1657), Teresa Del Po (1649-1716), Geertruydt Roghman (1625-??),Luisa Ignacia Roldan (1656-1704), Susan Penelope Rosse (1652-1700), Anna Elisabeth Ruysch (1666-c.1741), Rachel Ruysch (1664-1750), Elisabetta Sirani (1638-1665), Claudine Bouzonnet Stella (1636-1697), Gesina ter Borch, Maria van Oosterwyck (1630-1693), Magdalena van de Passe (c.1600-1640), Anna Maria Van Schurman (1607-1668), Anna Waser (1675-c.1713), Anne Allen, Ann Bateman (1749-1815), Hester Bateman (1708-1794), Lady Diana Beauclerk (1734-1808), Marie-Guillemine Benoist (1768-1826), Elizabeth Blackwell (1700-1747), Alice Burrows (c.1776-??), Sarah Buttall (c.1734-??), Rosalba Carriera (1675-1757), Marie Anne Collot (1748-1821), Maria Cosway (1760-1838), Louisa Courtauld (1729-1807), Mary Ann Croswell (c.1775-??), Anne Seymour Damer (1748-1823), Marie Nicole Dumont (1767-1846), Rose Adélaïde Ducreux (1761-1802), Francoise Duparc (1726-1778), Rebecca Emes (c.1778-1829), Amelia Farnborough(1762-1837), Magdalen Feline (C.1733-??), Marie Anne Gérard Fragonard / Madame Fragonard (1745-1823), Marguerite Gérard (1761-1837), Marie-Eleonore Godefroid (1778-1849), Elizabeth Godfrey (c.1700-??), Antoinette Haudebourt-Lescot
Henrietta Johnson (c.1670-c.1728), Angelica Kauffman (1741-1807),Adélaïde Labille-Guiard (1749-1803), Dorothy Langlands (c.1783-??), Marie-Victoire Lemoine (1754-1820), Elizabeth Leveson-Gower, Countess of Sutherland (1765-1839),
Anna Dorothea Liszewska-Therbusch (1721-1782), Marie Anne Loir (1715-1769), Amelia Long (1772-1821), Constance Mayer (1775-1821), Charlotte Mercier (1738-1762), Dorothy Mills (c.1716-??), Marie-Genevieve Navarre (1737-1795), Ulrica Frederika Pasch (1735-1796), Eunice Pinney (1770-1849), Maria Catherine Prestel, nee Hull (1744-1794), Luisa Roldan, Adèle Romany (1769-1846), Frances Scott (1750-1817),Anne Valleyer-Costa(1744-1818), Maria Verelst (1680-1744), Elisabeth-Louise Vigée-Lebrun (1755-1842), Marie-Denise Villers (1174-1821), Anna Waser (1675-c.1713), Caroline Watson (1758-1814), Clara Wheatley ((c.1750-1838), Patience Wright (1725-1786), Louise Abbema (1858-1927), Sophie Anderson (1855-1903), Maria Bashkirtseff, Amelia Bauerley, Leila T. Bauman, Cecilia Beaux (1855-1942), Camille Bellanger, Enella Benedict (1858-1942),Anna Bilinska (1857-1893), Charlotte Bonaparte (1802-1837), Rosa Bonheur (1822-1899), Elizabeth Gardener Bouguereau (1837-1922), Marie Bracquemond (1841-1916), Jennie Augusta Brownscombe (1850-1936), Anne Frances Byrne (1775-1837), Kate Elizabeth Bunce, Margaret Lesley Bush-Brown (1857-1944), Elizabeth Thompson Butler, Julia Margaret Cameron (1815-1879), Mary Helen Carlisle (1869-1925), Emily Carr (1871-1945), Louisa Starr Canziani, Mary Cassatt (1844-1926), Minerva Chapman (1858-1947), Mary Millicent Chaplin, Camille Claudel (1864-1943), Gabrielle de Veaux Clements (1858-1948), Edith Ellenborough Corbet, Maria Dixon, Susan Macdowell Eakins (1851-1938), Semantha Fairbanks, Ellen Bowditch, Thayer Fisher ,Camille Flers (1802-1868), Elizabeth A. Armstrong Forbes (1859-1912), Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale, Eva Gonzalès (1849-1883), Lady Gordon (1775-1821), Adrienne-Marie-Louise Grandpierre-Deverzy (1798-1855), Bessie Pease Gutmann (1876-1960), Ann Hall (1792-1863), Antoinette-Cecile Hortense Haudebourt-Lescot (1784-1845), Claude Raguet Hirst (1855-1942), Anne Brownell Jameson, Anna Klumpke (1856-1942), Mary Edmonia Lewis (1845-1879),Marie-Françoise-Constance Mayer-Lamartinière (1775-1821),Anna Lea Merritt, Harriet Jane Moore (1801-1884), Mary Nimmo Moran (1842-1899), Evelyn Pickering de Morgan (1850-1919), Berthe Morisot (1841-1895), Laura Mott, Elizabeth Nourse (1859-1938), Emily Mary Osborn, Deborah Griscom Passmore (1840-1911), Anna Claypoole Peale (1791-1878),Sarah Miriam Peale (1800-1885), Lilla Cabot Perry (1848-1933), Mary King Porter (1865-1938),Constance Pott (1862-1937), Otagaki Rengetsu (1791-1875), Ellen Robbins (1828-1905),Christina Robertson, Ann Sanders, Rolinda Sharples (1793-1838), Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal (1829-1862), Rebecca Solomon (1832-1886), Lilly Martin Spencer (1822-1902), Marie Spartali Stillman (1844-1927), Annie Swynnerton, Suzanne Valadon (1865-1938),Lady Wharncliffe (c.1776-1821), Mary Wicks.
complete list: <a href="
http://www.wendy.com/women/artists.html ... ts.html</a>
Thomas