Julia Cartwright Ady
Encyclopedia
Julia Mary Cartwright Ady (née Cartwright) (1851 - 28 April 1924) was an English art critic and historian of Italian renaissance.
, Northamptonshire
, the daughter of Richard Aubrey Cartwright and Hon Mary Fremantle, daughter of Thomas Fremantle, 1st Baron Cottesloe
. She was educated privately. Her uncle William Cornwallis Cartwright
was an art collector, and allowed her early access to his library and gallery at Aynhoe Park
, Northamptonshire
. In 1868, she toured France, Austria, and Italy with her family.
, and also wrote for the Monthly Packet
, and for a series of "The Lives of the Saints". series. She read works on renaissance art, including those of Anna Jameson, John Ruskin
, Charles Lock Eastlake
, Walter Pater
, and particularly the New History of Painting in Italy by Joseph Archer Crowe
and Giovanni Battista Cavalcaselle
. In 1873 she submitted an article on Giotto to Macmillan's Magazine, which was turned down at the time, but appeared later in the New Quarterly in 1877.Cartwright continued to write art criticism for journals such as Portfolio and the Magazine of Art. She visited Italy at least three times in the 1870s and on one of these occasions met Rev William Henry Ady whom she persuaded to take up the post of rector at Edgcote
and married in 1880. In 1881, Cartwright, now known as Mrs Henry Ady, published her first art history, Mantegna
and Francia. In 1894 she met Bernard Berenson
and in 1897 toured Siena with Berenson's future wife Mary Costelloe under the guidance of Herbert Horne
In 1903 her book on Botticelli was first published and in 1905 she published a book on Raphael
.
mistress of Edmund Walle, Henrietta, Duchess of Orléans, sister of Charles II, Isabella d'Este
the renaissance art patron, Baldassare Castiglione
and Christina of Denmark
, the art-loving Danish expatriate. In 1914 Ady published a collection of her articles as The Italian Gardens of the Renaissance and other Studies.
, Edward Burne-Jones
and Watts, Millet, Bastien-Lepage, and Puvis de Chavannes. She was positive about some forms of modern art, but was shocked at the 1912 Post-impressionism
exhibition mounted by Roger Fry
at the Grafton Galleries. Her views of art were those of Victorian
England which appreciated Raphael and disparaged Post-Impressionism. Her art criticism reflects that of Pater and Giovanni Morelli whom she read in the 1880s, and her friendship with the writer and art author Vernon Lee.
Early life
Cartwright was born at EdgcoteEdgcote
Edgcote is a village and civil parish on the River Cherwell in south-west Northamptonshire. The parish is bounded by the river to the north and by one of its tributaries to the east...
, Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire is a landlocked county in the English East Midlands, with a population of 629,676 as at the 2001 census. It has boundaries with the ceremonial counties of Warwickshire to the west, Leicestershire and Rutland to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshire to the south-east,...
, the daughter of Richard Aubrey Cartwright and Hon Mary Fremantle, daughter of Thomas Fremantle, 1st Baron Cottesloe
Thomas Fremantle, 1st Baron Cottesloe
Thomas Francis Fremantle, 1st Baron Cottesloe PC, PC , JP , known as Sir Thomas Fremantle, Bt, between 1821 and 1874, was a British Tory politician.-Early life:...
. She was educated privately. Her uncle William Cornwallis Cartwright
William Cornwallis Cartwright
William Cornwallis Cartwright was an art collector, author and a Liberal Party politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1868 to 1885-Biography:...
was an art collector, and allowed her early access to his library and gallery at Aynhoe Park
Aynhoe Park
Aynhoe Park, is a Grade I listed 17th-century country house rebuilt after the English Civil War on the southern edge of the stone-built village of Aynho near Banbury, Oxfordshire. It overlooks the Cherwell valley that divides Northamptonshire from Oxfordshire. The house represents four...
, Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire is a landlocked county in the English East Midlands, with a population of 629,676 as at the 2001 census. It has boundaries with the ceremonial counties of Warwickshire to the west, Leicestershire and Rutland to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshire to the south-east,...
. In 1868, she toured France, Austria, and Italy with her family.
Publications
In 1871 Cartwright contributed an article in Aunt Judy's MagazineAunt Judy's Magazine
Aunt Judy's Magazine was a British magazine for young people founded in 1866 by Margaret Gatty and continued after her death in 1873 by her daughter Horatia Eden until 1885. It published much of the work of Juliana Horatia Ewing and perhaps most notably "Fairy Sylvie" and "Bruno's Revenge", two...
, and also wrote for the Monthly Packet
Monthly Packet
The Monthly Packet was an English magazine published between 1851 and 1899. It was founded by members of the Oxford Movement to counter Anglo-Catholic extremism. It was strongly influenced by its first editor, the novelist Charlotte Yonge. Its aims were to provide instruction, entertainment, and...
, and for a series of "The Lives of the Saints". series. She read works on renaissance art, including those of Anna Jameson, John Ruskin
John Ruskin
John Ruskin was the leading English art critic of the Victorian era, also an art patron, draughtsman, watercolourist, a prominent social thinker and philanthropist. He wrote on subjects ranging from geology to architecture, myth to ornithology, literature to education, and botany to political...
, Charles Lock Eastlake
Charles Lock Eastlake
Sir Charles Lock Eastlake RA was an English painter, gallery director, collector and writer of the early 19th century.-Early life:...
, Walter Pater
Walter Pater
Walter Horatio Pater was an English essayist, critic of art and literature, and writer of fiction.-Early life:...
, and particularly the New History of Painting in Italy by Joseph Archer Crowe
Joseph Archer Crowe
Sir Joseph Archer Crowe , was an English consular official and art critic, whose volumes of the History of Painting in Italy, co-written with the Italian critic Giovanni Battista Cavalcaselle , stand at the beginning of disciplined modern art history writing in English,...
and Giovanni Battista Cavalcaselle
Giovanni Battista Cavalcaselle
Giovanni Battista Cavalcaselle was an Italian writer and art critic.-Biography:Cavalcaselle was born in Legnago, Veneto. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice. Cavalcaselle participated in the Revolution of 1848 and in the Roman Republic.After the latter's fall, he lived in England for...
. In 1873 she submitted an article on Giotto to Macmillan's Magazine, which was turned down at the time, but appeared later in the New Quarterly in 1877.Cartwright continued to write art criticism for journals such as Portfolio and the Magazine of Art. She visited Italy at least three times in the 1870s and on one of these occasions met Rev William Henry Ady whom she persuaded to take up the post of rector at Edgcote
Edgcote
Edgcote is a village and civil parish on the River Cherwell in south-west Northamptonshire. The parish is bounded by the river to the north and by one of its tributaries to the east...
and married in 1880. In 1881, Cartwright, now known as Mrs Henry Ady, published her first art history, Mantegna
Andrea Mantegna
Andrea Mantegna was an Italian painter, a student of Roman archeology, and son in law of Jacopo Bellini. Like other artists of the time, Mantegna experimented with perspective, e.g., by lowering the horizon in order to create a sense of greater monumentality...
and Francia. In 1894 she met Bernard Berenson
Bernard Berenson
Bernard Berenson was an American art historian specializing in the Renaissance. He was a major figure in pioneering art attribution and therefore establishing the market for paintings by the "Old Masters".-Personal life:...
and in 1897 toured Siena with Berenson's future wife Mary Costelloe under the guidance of Herbert Horne
Herbert Horne
Herbert Percy Horne was an English poet, architect, typographer and designer, art historian and antiquarian. He was an associate of the Rhymer's Club in London...
In 1903 her book on Botticelli was first published and in 1905 she published a book on Raphael
Raphael
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino , better known simply as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur...
.
Biographies of women
Ady was able to raise the prominence of women as art writers through art criticism and her biographies of women. Her subjects included Dorothy SidneyDorothy Spencer, Countess of Sunderland
Dorothy Spencer, Countess of Sunderland was the wife of Henry Spencer, 1st Earl of Sunderland and the daughter of Robert Sidney, 2nd Earl of Leicester....
mistress of Edmund Walle, Henrietta, Duchess of Orléans, sister of Charles II, Isabella d'Este
Isabella d'Este
Isabella d'Este was Marchesa of Mantua and one of the leading women of the Italian Renaissance as a major cultural and political figure. She was a patron of the arts as well as a leader of fashion, whose innovative style of dressing was copied by women throughout Italy and at the French court...
the renaissance art patron, Baldassare Castiglione
Baldassare Castiglione
Baldassare Castiglione, count of was an Italian courtier, diplomat, soldier and a prominent Renaissance author.-Biography:Castiglione was born into an illustrious Lombard family at Casatico, near Mantua, where his family had constructed an impressive palazzo...
and Christina of Denmark
Christina of Denmark
Christina of Denmark was a Danish princess who became Duchess-consort of Milan, then Duchess-consort of Lorraine...
, the art-loving Danish expatriate. In 1914 Ady published a collection of her articles as The Italian Gardens of the Renaissance and other Studies.
Art appreciation
Ady's initial interest in renaissance art expanded to include contemporary artists, in particular Turner, Landseer, and Whistler and moved on the Pre-Raphaelites Dante Gabriel RossettiDante Gabriel Rossetti
Dante Gabriel Rossetti was an English poet, illustrator, painter and translator. He founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1848 with William Holman Hunt and John Everett Millais, and was later to be the main inspiration for a second generation of artists and writers influenced by the movement,...
, Edward Burne-Jones
Edward Burne-Jones
Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1st Baronet was a British artist and designer closely associated with the later phase of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, who worked closely with William Morris on a wide range of decorative arts as a founding partner in Morris, Marshall, Faulkner, and Company...
and Watts, Millet, Bastien-Lepage, and Puvis de Chavannes. She was positive about some forms of modern art, but was shocked at the 1912 Post-impressionism
Post-Impressionism
Post-Impressionism is the term coined by the British artist and art critic Roger Fry in 1910 to describe the development of French art since Manet. Fry used the term when he organized the 1910 exhibition Manet and Post-Impressionism...
exhibition mounted by Roger Fry
Roger Fry
Roger Eliot Fry was an English artist and art critic, and a member of the Bloomsbury Group. Establishing his reputation as a scholar of the Old Masters, he became an advocate of more recent developments in French painting, to which he gave the name Post-Impressionism...
at the Grafton Galleries. Her views of art were those of Victorian
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
England which appreciated Raphael and disparaged Post-Impressionism. Her art criticism reflects that of Pater and Giovanni Morelli whom she read in the 1880s, and her friendship with the writer and art author Vernon Lee.
Personal life
After her husband's death in 1915, Ady moved to Oxford and died there in 1924. Her daughter,Cecilia Ady (1881–1958) was also a renaissance historian.Publications
- Raphael in Rome. London: Seeley1895
- Sandro Botticelli. London: Duckworth & Co., 1903
- Isabella d'Este, Marchioness of Mantua, 1474-1539: a Study of the Renaissance. 2 vols. New York : E.P. Dutton, 1903
- Baldassare Castiglione, the Perfect Courtier: his Life and Letters, 1478-1529. New York: E. P. Dutton and Co., 1908
- Christina of Denmark, Duchess of Milan and Lorraine, 1522-1590. London: J. Murray, 1913
- Italian Gardens of the Renaissance, and Other Studies. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1914
- Painters of Florence from the Thirteenth to the Sixteenth Century. New York, E. P. Dutton & Co., 1916
- Christ and his Mother in Italian Art. London: Bliss, Sands, 1917