Jesse Locker
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jessemlocker.bsky.social
Jesse Locker
@jessemlocker.bsky.social
10K followers 1.8K following 2.7K posts
Professor of art history at Portland State University. Author of Artemisia Gentileschi: The Language of Painting (Yale University Press) and some other stuff. 2 parts Weltschmerz, 1 part vermouth, a dash of film noir.
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jessemlocker.bsky.social
Mood
Franz Xaver Messerschmidt (1736-1783) The Yawner, 1771-83 Tin cast Szépművészeti Múzeum (Museum of Fine Arts), Budapest https://www.mfab.hu/artworks/2941/
November 10, 2025 at 3:16 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Elijah Boardman, Portrait of Connecticut dry-goods merchant  Ralph Earl, 1789 Oil on canvas, 83 x 51 in. (210.8 x 129.5 cm) (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Itinerant portrait painter Ralph Earl depicted the elegantly dressed dry-goods merchant Elijah Boardman (1760–1823) in his shop in New Milford, Connecticut. An unconventional setting for a full-length portrait, the work offered Boardman an opportunity to display his vast merchandise. An open door on the left reveals the shopkeeper’s textile inventory, including silks, wools, printed cottons, and linens—several of which he imported from India, China, and Europe through English ports. Although not pictured, Boardman also sold luxury goods from the Spanish West Indies, such as sugar, rum, molasses, and indigo, connecting the patrons of his Connecticut shop to the extensive networks of Atlantic trade.
November 9, 2025 at 6:55 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
do you guys have artemisia pants yet
Black pants with Artemisia Gentileschi's Judith Beheading Holofernes printed on them
November 8, 2025 at 4:26 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Early Florentine self-portrait by Artemisia Gentileschi on view at Christie's in New York, and up for auction in in February. I just saw it in August and it's very close to her Inclination in the Casa Buonarroti (c. 1615) and other early self-portraits in Florence (thanks, @pjeromack.bsky.social!)
A close in self-portrait of the artist looking out at the viewer, wearing a crown, holding a palm, and a part of a wheel of St. Catherine visible A detail of close in self-portrait of the artist looking out at the viewer, wearing a crown, holding a palm, and a part of a wheel of St. Catherine visible
November 8, 2025 at 12:28 AM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
"In the Seventeenth Century, Naples was full of Women's Voices": 67 works by women on view at the Gallerie d’Italia in Naples. www.ilgiornaledellarte.com/Mostre/Nel-S...
Unknown Neapolitan artist, St. Cecilia (detail), c. 1640, Sarasota, Florida, State Art Museum of Florida
November 7, 2025 at 7:21 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
From the 1860s, but feels so modern.

[Fidelia Bridges, Garden View, Brooklyn, ca. 1867, Watercolor and gouache, with traces of graphite underdrawing, on tan hot-pressed wove paper, 8 × 5 1/8 in. (20.3 × 13 cm) (Metropolitan Museum of Art)]
View out a window into a yard and brick row houses across the street https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/853646
November 7, 2025 at 5:23 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Claude Lorrain, View of the Acqua Acetosa, c. 1645, pen and brown ink and brush and brown wash over graphite (Cleveland Museum of Art)
"This drawing represents a view of the famous Acqua Acetosa, a mineral spring that until the 19th century provided the favored drinking water of Romans who believed in its healing powers. Although topographically accurate, the sheet is not a plein-air study but a vision of an imagined Arcadian world carefully rendered by Gellée, one of the most original painters of the 17th century. The French-born artist spent his career painting and drawing the Roman Campagna and the Neopolitan coastline. Sublimely beautiful pen-and-ink and wash drawings such as the example here reveal the artist's highly poetic response to the natural world and his unparalleled sensitivity to light." https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1928.15.a
November 7, 2025 at 3:02 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
It always makes me think of this though
Sickos meme: Guy looking through a window say yes... ha ha ha... yes! wearing a shirt that say sickos
November 6, 2025 at 3:19 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
A new work thought to be from Artemisia Gentileschi's Neapolitan period up for auction at Christie's www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-6...
A painting of a kneeling woman holding and infant out toward St. Blaise, enthroned and dressed as a bishop, who makes a gesture of blessing
November 5, 2025 at 10:29 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
A portrait by Sofonisba Anguissola the centerpiece of "Poetic Portraits: Allegory and Identity in Sixteenth-Century Europe" at Timken Museum of Art in San Diego www.timkenmuseum.org/news/poetic-...
"The identification of this elderly gentleman sitting at a desk in his study is borne out by the inscription on the fore edge of the book he is writing in, which displays the words "rime del casellio". Giovanni Battista Caselli was a poet and medal engraver who enjoyed certain prominence in Cremona during his lifetime...Sofonisba demonstrates she is a keenly observant painter capable of describing details such as the books and Caselli’s hands and head with subtle realism... The poet looks up from his work -writing praise for the Virgin- and points with his left hand to the small picture of the Virgin and Child with the infant Saint John hanging on the background wall. The text is written in Italian in elegant humanist miniscule. On top of the other books piled on the table is a small armillary sphere that was concealed by a portable crucifix until the canvas was cleaned in 2011." https://www.museodelprado.es/en/the-collection/art-work/giovanni-battista-caselli-poet-from-cremona/f106661c-11c1-4e5f-ba6e-7992ac8d1b4c
November 5, 2025 at 5:04 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Formerly attributed to Domenico Fetti, the authorship of this lovely 17th-century painting in Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest, remains uncertain
A painting of a young, fashionably dressed girl who seems to have fallen asleep atop a brocade cloth while grasping a lace handkerchief https://www.mfab.hu/artworks/8696/
November 4, 2025 at 3:22 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Morris Kantor, Captain’s House, 1929, oil on canvas, 1929, 26 1/8 x 30 in. (66.2 x 76.2 cm) (Smithsonian American Art Museum)
A man in 19th-century costume reads in a rocking chair in a cozy interior. Boundaries picture window behind him seems to dissolve into a New England maritime landscape with a view of the water and a lighthouse, as does the painting of an old ship above the fireplace, in which water and sky seem to spill beyond the frame
November 3, 2025 at 5:03 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Pier Francesco Cittadini, called il Milanese, Still Life with Fruit and Vegetables, a Cat and a Bird, and Two Figures, c. 1650–1660 (Gallerie Estensi, Modena)
"With a style that is both aristocratic and informal, the four still lifes (inv. nos. 48, 54, 224, 225) brilliantly reflect the courtly taste promoted by Duke Francesco I d'Este in his summer residence in Sassuolo. In the mid-17th century, the ancient residence underwent a complete transformation, and among the various painters and fresco artists involved, Cittadini, from Milan, was entrusted with the fruit, flowers, and vegetables he specialized in. These refined compositions, enlivened by animals and small stories, come from such an environment." https://gallerie-estensi.beniculturali.it/en/collections/works-of-art/#/dettaglio/72564e54-8ae9-4d0d-b222-eb621b2035c5
November 3, 2025 at 2:23 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Charles Baudelaire, Self-Portrait made while under the Influence of Hashish, c. 1844, watercolor on paper (Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris)
A messy watercolor of the poet standing in profile, wearing a top had and black coat, a joint in his mouth and a cloud of black smoke, and an eye looking suspiciously at the viewer. Behind him is the Place Vendôme, Paris, and the sunrise, above, a comet streaks through the sky
November 3, 2025 at 2:14 AM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Artemisia Gentileschi, Self Portrait as St. Catherine of Alexandria, c. 1615 (Private Collection)
A close in self-portrait of the artist looking out at the viewer, wearing a crown, holding a palm, and a part of a wheel of St. Catherine visible
November 3, 2025 at 1:08 AM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Fujita Tsuguharu (Léonard Tsugouharu Foujita), Self-portrait with Cat, c. 1920s, Color woodblock print, 38.8 × 28.5 cm (15 1/8 × 11 3/16 in.) (Art Institute of Chicago)
A self-portrait of the artist with a bowl cut, round glasses, a blue shirt, and a cranky cat leering over his shoulder
November 2, 2025 at 5:42 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Thomas Smith, Self-Portrait, c. 1680, oil on canvas, 24 2/5 x 23 3/5 inches (62 x 60 cm) (Worcester Art Museum) #SelfPortraitSunday
"This painting is the earliest known American self-portrait, and the only known 17th-century New England portrait by an identified artist. An account book at Harvard College records Smith as a portrait painter. The naval battle in the background, with ships flying British and Dutch flags, suggests Smith also had a maritime career. Beyond that, his biography is difficult to determine with certainty, since at least three mariners named Thomas Smith lived in the Boston area at the end of the 17th century. This self-portrait reflects a shift in American art from the highly decorative, Elizabethan style to the three-dimensional baroque style. Employing light and shadow to create an illusion of space, Smith masterfully captures his somber, yet astute presence, indicated by his black attire. Objects like the skull and octonaire—an eight-line devotional lyric, with the artist’s initials (“T S”)—signal the prominent themes of human mortality and vanity in Puritan culture." https://worcester.emuseum.com/objects/18307/selfportrait
November 2, 2025 at 5:02 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Man Ray, Jean Cocteau Creating a Self-Portrait Out of Wire, ca. 1928, Gelatin silver print, 11.3 x 8.4 cm (Centre Pompidou, Paris) #SelfPortraitSunday
A black-and-white photo of poet, artist, and filmmaker Jean Cocteau, at work on a larger than life size self-portrait made of white wire
November 2, 2025 at 4:59 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
If you're in the Minneapolis area, Sheila Barker will be speaking tomorrow on "Artemisia Gentileschi and the Ghost of Michelangelo" at the MIA new.artsmia.org/event/guest-... #mn #arthistory
Artemisia Gentileschi (1593–1654), Allegory of Inclination (detail), 1615–1617, Oil on canvas. Ceiling of the Galleria in the Casa Buonarroti, Florence. Image courtesy of the Casa Buonarroti.
November 1, 2025 at 2:31 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Joachim von Sandrart, The Month of November (Staatsgalerie, Schleissheim), 1643
A young hunter wearing a fur hat return to the village on a grey windy day, with two hounds and dead rabbits and partridges(?) tied up
November 1, 2025 at 1:42 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Andy Warhol, Halloween, 1949, lithograph in black on wove paper, 28.2 x 18.5 cm (National Gallery of Art)
Stylized black-and white print of children in Halloween costumes
November 1, 2025 at 5:00 AM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Detroit has an amazing museum! But here's the provenance
Provenance until ca. 1846, Collection Sir Brooke Boothby (1744-1824) (Ashbourne Hall, Derbyshire, England). by 1879, Collection H. Haskett Smith Troweswell, Goudhurst,England); May 9 1896, auction, lot 78, Viscount Eversley and other collections, Christie's (London, England). collection Earl of Harrowby (Stafford, England). by November 1947, (Roland, Browse and Delbanco, London, England); 1950-1955, (Durlacher Brothers, New York, New York, USA); 1955-present, purchase by the Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, Michigan, USA)
November 1, 2025 at 3:37 AM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Henry Fuseli, The Nightmare, 1781, Oil on canvas, 101 x 127 cm (Institute of Arts, Detroit)
A woman is sprawled across a bed with a demon sitting on her chest. In the shadows is a black horse with glowing eyes
November 1, 2025 at 3:31 AM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Francisco de Goya, Witches' Sabbath, 1789, Oil on canvas, 43 x 30 cm (Museo Lázaro Galdiano, Madrid)
"This impressive painting by Goya was part of a series of six on the theme of witchcraft commissioned by the Dukes of Osuna to decorate their "El Capricho" estate near Madrid. The main character in the scene is the devil, depicted as a large male goat who is being given two boys as an offering. It depicts an episode inspired by the 1610 Logroño auto-da-fé, and this set of paintings as a whole is considered to be a satirical criticism of the superstitions of the educated society to which the Dukes of Osuna and the painter belonged." (Google Arts & Culture)
October 31, 2025 at 9:55 PM
jessemlocker.bsky.social
Happy Halloween!

[Gian Jacopo Caraglio after Rosso Fiorentino, Fury personified as an emaciated man astride a monster, holding a skull in his raised left hand, c. 1525, engraving on laid paper, sheet- 25.1 x 18.7 cm (9 7/8 x 7 3/8 in.) (Metropolitan Museum of Art)]
Fury personified as an emaciated man astride a monster, holding a skull in his raised left hand and various strange beasts in a gnarled wood
October 31, 2025 at 3:24 PM