Клеопатра, обнаруженная слугами

By the 1630s Artemisia Gentileschi was working in Naples, the busiest art city in Italy, painting the strong women she was known for. Here she shows Cleopatra just after death, sprawled back on her bed as two servants arrive to find her, the asp's venom already in her body, the hand that held the snake gone grey and slack. For a long stretch afterward the picture was catalogued under the name of a male Neapolitan painter, Massimo Stanzione. That was a common fate for Artemisia's work. Her paintings were repeatedly reassigned to men, partly because a canvas by a famous male master fetched a higher price. Only in recent decades have scholars given this Cleopatra back to her. The two servants lean in from the edge, caught in the first instant of finding their queen.