"Veronica Franco"

instant photograph (Polaroid)

signed, titled, dated and numbered on verso

Veronica Franco (ca 1546 – 1591)
First Courtesan of Italy   Daughter of the courtesan Paola Fracassa, who taught the girl singing, music and poetry, Veronica Franco began learning the erotic arts and the ways of the concubine at a tender age. Although married for a brief time to the doctor Paolo Panizza, from the age of twenty Veronica Franco was listed as number 204 in the official registry of Venice’s “most respectable” courtesans. Loved and painted by Titian and Paolo Veronese, she was visited by Michel de Montaigne and was esteemed and favoured by literary critic Domenico Venier. The guest list of this woman who chose to make “a virtue of her necessity” included the Count of Mantua and Cadinal Luigi d’Este. She is even mentioned in the Venetian protocol of the official visit of Henry III of France in 1574, and precisely in the liveliest part of this document. On this occasion she won the title of “First Courtesan  of Italy.” Her volume of poetry, “Terze Rime” was published in 1575. In 1577, the mother of six children from the same number of illegitimate relationships, she founded the first public house for women, calling it “Casa del soccorso” or the “House of Assistance”, created to help abused wives and ex-prostitutes begin a new life. At the same time, she openly returned to practising the world’s oldest profession and gave her consent to the controversial “Inferno monacale”, written by the Venetian Arcangela Tarabotti. Denounced for witchcraft, black magic and heresy in 1580, she was called upon by the inquisition, where she managed to save herself with her eloquence. Having done all she could for her social cause, robbed and cheated by her own servants, overtired with the burden of caring for her children and those left in her care upon the death of her brother, Veronica Franco died in the popular quarters of San Samuele, victim of typhus or syphilis. Veronica’s happy ending would have to wait for four centuries before coming true with production of the 1997 Hollywood film in her honour, “Dangerous Beauty”.

Donne Illustri
Caffà Florian on St Mark’s Square in Venice: in the “Sala degli Uomini Illustri” (salon of famous men) hang ten oil paintings by Giulio Carlini (1826–1887). Irene Andessner confronts these posthumously painted portraits of famous Venetians – from Marco Polo via Titian to Goldoni – with ten Venetian women, among them the city’s most famous composer (Barbara Strozzi) and painter (Rosalba Carriera) and the most expensive courtesan (Veronica Franco), as well as the first female doctor (Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia) and the world’s first female lawyer (Moderata Fonte). Through this intervention the Sala degli Uomini Illustri is transformed into the Sala delle Donne Illustri (salon of famous women). A picture puzzle-like disturbance: disregarding make-up, wardrobe, light, decoration and pictorial detail, Andessner’s portrayals differ from the historical picture references of the ten female figures in that she has not copied the bearing and look of the women, but rather of the men from the portraits hanging above. Thus the self-perception, the pre-potency of the male counterparts is broken. 

A further room, the Saletta Liberty, is turned into the “Moderata Fonte Room” with a Fonte/Andessner photographic full-length self-portrait in a light box. Opposite this portrait Andessner places a “Fonte” portrait painted in oil on canvas, for which she sat as model in the workshop of Marinella Biscaro.
“7 Gentildonne”: as a preliminary to the exhibition Andessner convenes a meeting of seven Italians in the Caffà Florian men’s salon – inspired by Moderata Fonte’s debate in the novel “Verdienst der Frauen” [merit of women], documented as a video work. In the photo production for the Venice project there are additional full-length portraits, which transpose into our time the historicised portrayals of women (only visible in oval bust details in the room installation) by means of complete styling. In these images it can also be seen that the artist has the camera shutter release in her hand; which means – in contrast to earlier productions – she releases the image herself in just that moment when she herself inwardly feels the particular role so fully that she is sure she is bringing the personality of that model woman perfectly to expression. This way of working corresponds to the historical Venetian women, who likewise developed and lived out their professions self-determined and self-employed, independent of men. The full-length self-portraits are executed as light boxes. 
The “Donne Illustri” project, curated by Stefano Stipitivich, takes place under the auspices of the Art Programme of the Caffà Florian. Started over 15 years ago by the caf» owner and art collector Daniela Gaddo Vedaldi, the series of exhibitions has so far represented artists such as Mimmo Rotella (1990), Fabrizio Plessi (1993 and 2001) and Luca Buvoli (1997)