10 Facts About Barbara Longhi

Barbara Longhi was much admired in her lifetime as a portraitist, although most of her portraits are now lost or unattributed.

Barbara Longhi's father, Luca Longhi, was a well-known Mannerist painter, and her older brother Francesco was a painter.

Barbara Longhi modeled, and gained some familiarity with the process of marketing her artwork to patrons.

Barbara Longhi was very respected as a portraitist, but only one of her portraits, the Camaldolese Monk, is known today.

Barbara Longhi sought to evoke empathy in the viewer with her subjects.

Barbara Longhi resisted the trend to create huge Biblical scenes, instead concentrating on serene depictions of the Virgin and Child.

Barbara Longhi is one of the few female artists mentioned in the second edition of Italian painter and art historian Giorgio Vasari's epic work Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects.

Barbara Longhi is so wonderful in this art that her own father begins to be astonished by her, especially in her portraits as she barely glances at a person that she can portray better than anybody else with the sitter posing in front.

Barbara Longhi's paintings provide some insight into the Counter-Reformation's influence on regional art.

Barbara Longhi's work is represented in the collections of the Musee du Louvre, National Museum of Art of Romania, Pinacoteca di Brera, Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna, Museo Biblioteca del Grappa, and Indianapolis Museum of Art, and in the Santa Maria Maggiore.