Ferdinand I and His Family

Angelica Kauffmann was one of the very few women to reach the top of 18th-century painting, a founding member of London's Royal Academy before she settled in Italy. In 1782 she came to Naples to paint the royal family, and Queen Maria Carolina received her warmly and became a friend. The picture sets the king and queen at the centre with their many children gathered on either side. It was a huge and awkward commission, a whole dynasty to arrange in one balanced group, and Kauffmann did not even complete it in Naples. She carried it to Rome and finished it there, where the Italian poet Ippolito Pindemonte admired the result.