For this season of ArtCurious, I’m doing something a little bit different. I’m treating you to renditions of eight of my favorite segments from Breaking Barriers: Women Artists of Renaissance Europe, my online course found exclusively at avid.fm. Every other week through January, I’ll share selections from Breaking Barriers, and encourage you that if you like it, you can purchase the whole course. Today: Finding a signed, confirmed work by Levina Teerlinc isn’t an easy task, as we know of no surviving works with her signature. But we do know that Levina Teerlinc was almost single-handedly responsible for the popularization of the miniature portrait, and obviously she was good at it: Queen Elizabeth I commissioned her portrait from Teerlinc no less than eight times. From Breaking Barriers: Women of Renaissance Europe, please enjoy “Levina Teerlinc: Tiny Tudor Treasures.”

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Episode Transcript

Hi there, Curious people! Welcome back to the ArtCurious podcast, where we explore the unexpected, slightly odd, and strangely wonderful in art history. If you’ve listened to our last episode, you’ll know that this season of the podcast is different. Instead of our usual spate of new episodes, I’m taking a little time off to research a new book--yay!-- so I’m sharing some slightly zhug-ed renditions of eight of my favorite segments from my audio course, Breaking Barriers: Women Artists of Renaissance Europe. Breaking Barriers is a 21-day course, meaning that you get essentially a mini-episode of ArtCurious every day for three weeks straight, and the unique opportunity to learn about some artists that you may have never heard of before--and they are likely to blow your mind, or become your next favorite artist. That’s three weeks, with every day featuring the story of a new Renaissance painter, sculptor, miniature maker-- from Sofonisba Anguissola and Marietta Robusti to lesser-known artists like Plautilla Nelli and Levina Teerlinc, this course will lead you through the lives and careers of groundbreaking women who’ve made their marks on art history. This evergreen course is all about learning for fun, no tests, no papers, no quizzes, just cool content that you can access on your own time so you can learn at your own pace. Register for the course and start learning today at Avid.fm/jennifer. In the meantime, here’s one of my favorite snippets from Breaking Barriers, about an artist I mentioned just a moment ago-- Levina Teerlinc, whose life takes us on back to Elizabethan England.

In our Breaking Barriers segment on the English manuscript artist and calligrapher Esther Inglis, I briefly discussed the various art forms and techniques that were considered suitable for Renaissance women--things like pastels and manuscript illumination. Another really popular art form that was seen as especially appropriate for women to create was the miniature: a teeny tiny portrait, usually done in watercolor or gouache, which is a type of opaque watercolor, though some miniatures were done in enamel as well. Miniatures were super popular in the 16th century in France and England, and their popularity then spread throughout the rest of Europe. Part of the expansion of their popularity is linked to their usage: they were often provided as gifts or mementos of loved ones, kind of like photos do now--a way to showcase the appearance of a loved one, a little hand-held image that you could show off to friends and family. Being so small and portable, the miniature was also adopted early on by those with a diplomatic bent, as a way to showcase unity and partnership across kingdoms, or as a manner of courting potential mates. And in England during the Tudor period, no one was better at miniatures than Levina Teerlinc. 

Levina Teerlinc, born Levina Bening, was born in Bruges, the fairly-tale-like canal town now part of modern-day Belgium. She was probably born around 1510, though the exact date--let alone the exact year-- is actually unknown. What we do know is that she was one of five daughters of a miniaturist father, so creating these little treasures was obviously in her blood. She was also related to the Flemish master Hugo van der Goes, so again--art seems to have been metaphorically embedded in her DNA. We don’t know a ton of information about Levina’s childhood, but we do know that, with a family with only daughters and with Levina as the eldest, it’s probable that her father taught her to paint because he needed someone to assist with the family business-- so in this way, she is similar to Lavinia Fontana, another artist from a non-aristocratic family who needed the assistance of a talented daughter to make ends meet. And just as with so many of the women we’ve discussed in Breaking Barriers so far, it obviously paid off, because Levina Teerlinc became a sought-after miniaturist in her own right, reaching even the highest echelons in Renaissance Europe. 

 We touched on miniatures lightly in our class on Esther Inglis, but now’s the time for them to come into the limelight. In brief, miniatures are really what they sound like-- they are teeny, tiny works of art-- mostly portraits, but not entirely, that were meant to fit in the palm of your hand, or to be carried in a pocket. Think of a locket-- a necklace with an opening clasp where you can insert an itty-bitty photo of a loved one. This was the Renaissance equivalent of that, and they were used similarly, as little reminders of your fave dreamboat, for example. And they were also used, like Esther Inglis’s illuminated manuscripts, for diplomatic purposes too, to highlight the connections between households and courts throughout Europe, but especially in France and England. And it was England where Levina would soon relocate.

 When she was in her mid-twenties or early thirties, and not too long after she married to her husband, George Teerlinc, she received an invitation to join the court of none other than the King of England, Henry VIII, the charming, lusty, and tyrannical monarch of the Tudor period. Henry needed a new painter around the royal court because his previous artist, Hans Holbein the Younger, had passed away a couple years prior. So, upon learning of Levina Teerlinc’s skills, he formally invited her to join his court as an official painter. And according to historian Roy Strong, author of Artists of the Tudor Court, documents survive that indicate that Teerlinc was paid a yearly salary of  £40 from 1546 when she began her tenure, all the way until her death in 1576. The Bank of England’s website, by the way, has a fantastic inflation calculator that showcases the equivalency of the British pound in today’s funds, going all the way back to the year 1209, which is an amazing tool and one that is truly fascinating to play around with. And get this:  £40 in 1545 was the equivalent to about 35,000 pounds today, or almost $40,000, according to the exchange rate on the day that I am recording this.Given surviving documentation, a highly successful Elizabethan merchant could make anywhere from £100 to £25,000 per year, so this puts Levina in the highest of highest earners for her time. That’s incredible. And what’s more-- this salary, officially granted by the king, was even larger than the salary he had paid to Hans Holbein, her predecessor. In short, it was a pretty sweet deal.

 For thirty years, Levina Teerlinc was funded in this manner as a royal portraitist, but she only worked directly with and for Henry VIII for little more than a year before he passed away in 1547. But she carried on as an official miniaturist throughout the tenures of three monarchs of the turbulent Tudor period, first painting for Henry’s successor, Edward VI, and then on to Mary Tudor and, finally, to Queen Elizabeth I, whose reign began in late 1558. As one of the few women artists who was allowed access to the female members of the royal household, Levina Teerlinc seems to have been especially popular choice with women in particular, which is why Teerlinc’s name is often attributed to so many wonderful images, like one of my favorites, her dual portrait of Lady Katharine Gray and her infant son, which some historians call a history-making image, as it is believed to be one of the earliest surviving secular--meaning not religious--images of a mother and her son. Teerlinc painted so well that even her own successor to the English court-- an artist named Nicholas Hilliard-- once remarked that he had believed her miniatures had been painted by a man, not a woman. That phrase feels derogatory to us today, but that’s not how Hilliard meant it. He meant it as the greatest of compliments-- praise for a woman whose works were so good that to find that they were done by a female artist was almost unheard of-- that’s just how esteemed her work was. 

 Not that it is easy to know for sure what works were actually completed by Levina Teerlinc, because… now say it with me, longtime listeners… she didn’t often, if ever, sign her pieces. Take a moment to think about it, just from a logical perspective: can you imagine how small her signature, or initials,  would have to be to be seen clearly in a miniature? It’s not a surprise in some ways, then, that her works weren’t often  signed, but alas, it does pose a significant challenge for art historians. I’ve discussed “attribution” briefly in previous episodes, both here in Breaking Barriers but also in episodes of ArtCurious, but let’s touch on that briefly here, because it bears repeating. Attributing a work of art to a particular artist  is not an exact science. Art experts can do as much research as possible, searching archives for historical documentation and compiling anything and everything to support their cases, but ultimately, sometimes a final determination of the maker of a work of art can be rather subjective, based on emotion or gut reaction as much as on solid facts. Historians and scholars are often left making their best educated guesses about artwork authenticity, so even though Teerlinc was one of the most widely documented artists of the Tudor period, it’s still hard to identify her works with 100% certainty. But we can have a few good guesses based on similarities of style. Teerlinc, who typically worked in watercolors, liked to depict her sitters’ upper bodies--not just their faces, so you would usually see their shoulders at the very least, and even their torsos on occasion. She also liked to recreate details as much as she could, which is why some of her works provide quite a sense of the intricacy of her subjects’ wardrobes. Her portrait of Elizabeth I, from around 1565, showcases the famed redhead with flowers in her pinned-up hair, with golden brocade sleeves, a velvet vest, and golden jewels embedded with dark gemstones. Placed in front of a traditional blue background, Elizabeth’s visage just pops. It's no wonder that Teerlinc received such praise: her works are eye-catching. And Elizabeth apparently loved her work, too, as records note that she commissioned her portrait from Teerlinc no less than eight times. 

 But it’s not just guesswork that brings us to an attribution to Levina Teerlinc. Another potential avenue involves looking to both her successor and her predecessor for additional assistance-- in other words, how were the  works of Hans Holbein and Nicholas Hilliard different from Teerlinc’s items? That’s a good route, but even that might be a bit tricky, and some art historians have further posited that some works by each of the male artists may be wrongly attributed to them--and may have, in reality, been created by Teerlinc. 

 Teerlinc died in her mid-sixties on June 26, 1576, and thankfully court records survive documenting many of the particular portraits and gifts she made for the Tudor court in her decades of service. The not-so-great thing is that quite a few of them have not been identified, or at least have not been located yet. And indeed, after not one but two fires at the royal palace of Whitehall in Westminster, which was the main residence of the royal family through the late 17th century, it’s entirely possible that many of Teerlinc’s works were destroyed. But you never know. With miniatures in particular, so small, so delicate, it wouldn’t be shocking to see one turn up in a private collection sometime. So keep your eyes out and your fingers crossed. You never know when you might happen upon a tiny Tudor treasure by Levina Teerlinc herself.

I so appreciate you taking the time to listen to ArtCurious today-- thank you so much, and I sincerely loved sharing the amazing royal career of Levina Teerlinc with you. As I mentioned at the top of the show, it would sure mean a lot to me as an independent creator if you would register for my course, Breaking Barriers: Women Artists of Renaissance Europe. It’s on sale right now, 21 days, learn on your own time and at your own pace, and it’s fun--I promise. No quizzes or grades, either, just learning for the sake of good old fashioned learning! Please register now at avid.fm/jennifer, and not only will you get the entire 21 day course, but you’ll also receive a PDF with every episode featuring the images discussed and a recommended reading list. So again, that’s Breaking Barriers: Women Artists of Renaissance Europe, available now at avid.fm/jennifer. 

I’ll be back with you again after the new year to share another story from Breaking Barriers. Thank you, again, for supporting me while I research my next project--you are awesome. Remember that we’ve got exclusive video content coming at you over on YouTube. So check us out there-the link is in the show notes on your handy-dandy podcast app right now. Stick with me, and stay curious!