Artistic Patronage at the Court of Queen Charlotte

Abstract

Charlotte supported all types of visual culture, but especially of the so-called "minor arts," such as engraving, embroidery, transparencies (illuminated paintings), wax modeling and miniature painting, fields which were traditionally open to or dominated by women. My dissertation demonstrates that Charlotte did not promote hierarchical distinctions prevalent in the larger art world, such as that between oil painting and the minor arts. Her patronage supplemented the limited opportunities available to women artists in other institutions and to create new career possibilities for women. The growth of such specifically feminine artistic patronage and production has, however, gone almost unnoticed by Georgian art historians. My dissertation supplies the history of one such circle: the alternative center for female creativity provided by Charlotte and the English court.