Lavinia Fontana

Lavinia Fontana was an Italian Mannerist painter active in Bologna and Rome, best known for her successful portraiture alongside mythological and religious subjects. Trained by her father Prospero Fontana, she is regarded as the first female career artist in Western Europe, supporting her family through commissions while her husband served as her agent and raised their eleven children. She is also considered among the first female artists to paint female nudes, though this remains debated among art historians.