Studieblad met drie weergaven van een lopende heer

Gesina ter Borch made this study of a gentleman walking, using pen in brown, in the Netherlands. Such figure studies were common in the 17th century, often included in model books for artists to consult. But here we see something a little different. Note how the man is viewed from three different angles. Rather than offering a template for the representation of a figure, perhaps Ter Borch is interested in the mobility of the body itself. Consider too that this work was produced by a woman. While Dutch society was relatively liberal, the art world remained dominated by men. Looking at the archive of drawings by Ter Borch and her contemporaries, one gets a sense of how female artists negotiated their own place in the art world, often through the subtle subversion of established norms. Art history shows us how meaning is contingent on social and institutional contexts and how much we can learn from deeper art historical research.