12 Famous Female Painters and the Paintings to Know

1. Frida Kahlo

1907 to 1954Mexican painter · Start with The Two Fridas

Kahlo used her own image to give complicated feelings a visible form. In The Two Fridas, two versions of the artist sit side by side, connected by a vein. One wears a white European-style dress and the other Tehuana clothing. The Museo de Arte Moderno in Mexico City connects this double portrait to the period of her separation from Diego Rivera. The exposed hearts make inner conflict impossible to hide. Museum source.

2. Georgia O’Keeffe

1887 to 1986American modernist · Start with Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1

O’Keeffe made the natural world feel monumental. Her close views of flowers transform petals into broad areas of color and shape. She also painted New York towers, animal bones and the New Mexico landscape. The flower painting Jimson Weed/White Flower No. 1 is a useful entry point, but it shows only one side of an artist whose abstractions were equally ambitious. Museum source.

3. Artemisia Gentileschi

1593 to about 1654Italian Baroque painter · Start with Judith Slaying Holofernes

Gentileschi turned a familiar biblical subject into a forceful account of action. Judith and her maid work together to overpower Holofernes. The bodies press toward the canvas and the light cuts across the struggle. Artemisia was much more than a painter of this one violent scene: she built a long career across Italian cities and painted many women whose decisions shape the story. Museum source.

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Judith Slaying Holofernes, painted by hand

Artemisia Gentileschi · oil on canvas, made to order

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4. Mary Cassatt

1844 to 1926American Impressionist · Start with The Boating Party

Cassatt is known for mothers and children, yet her paintings are also daring exercises in composition. In The Boating Party, the rower’s dark back divides the picture while the woman and child sit beyond him. Cassatt worked in Paris and exhibited with the Impressionists, bringing an American perspective to their exploration of modern life. Museum source.

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The Boating Party, painted by hand

Mary Cassatt · oil on canvas, made to order

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5. Berthe Morisot

1841 to 1895French Impressionist · Start with The Cradle

Morisot was part of Impressionism from its first exhibition. The Cradle shows her sister Edma watching her daughter sleep, but the painting is not simply a family scene. Its gauzy curtain, shifting whites and close framing make looking itself the subject. Morisot helped establish an artistic language for private moments without making them small. Museum source.

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The Cradle, painted by hand

Berthe Morisot · oil on canvas, made to order

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6. Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun

1755 to 1842French portrait painter · Start with Self-Portrait in a Straw Hat

Vigée Le Brun became a successful portraitist at the court of Marie Antoinette. In Self-Portrait in a Straw Hat, she presents herself holding a palette and brushes, confident in both her appearance and her profession. Her career continued across Europe after she left France during the Revolution. The picture insists that the person behind the portrait is an artist with a public identity. Museum source.

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Self-Portrait in a Straw Hat, painted by hand

Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun · oil on canvas, made to order

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7. Hilma af Klint

1862 to 1944Swedish abstract painter · Start with The Ten Largest

Af Klint’s The Ten Largest consists of vast, brightly colored works that move through stages of life. Their spirals, circles and botanical forms do not describe a single visible place. She made them within a larger spiritual project and did not see them enter the familiar story of modern abstraction during her lifetime. Today they change how many viewers understand the beginnings of abstract painting. Museum source.

8. Rosa Bonheur

1822 to 1899French animal painter · Start with The Horse Fair

Bonheur built an international reputation with The Horse Fair, a monumental scene of horses being handled at a Paris market. She treated animals as subjects worthy of large-scale painting and studied their movement closely. The smaller Wild Boars in the Snow, shown here, reveals the same careful attention to anatomy and behavior. Museum source.

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Wild Boars in the Snow, painted by hand

Rosa Maria Bonheur · oil on canvas, made to order

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9. Sofonisba Anguissola

about 1532 to 1625Italian Renaissance painter · Start with The Game of Chess

Anguissola made a scene of her sisters playing chess into a portrait of intelligence and personality. The players’ exchanged glances create a small drama without a heroic setting. Her skill took her from Cremona to the Spanish court. The painting is a reminder that Renaissance innovation also happened in family rooms, not only in palaces and churches. Museum source.

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Game of Chess 1555, painted by hand

Sofonisba Anguissola · oil on canvas, made to order

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10. Angelica Kauffman

1741 to 1807Swiss-born history painter · Start with Self-Portrait

Kauffman succeeded in portraiture and history painting, a genre from which many women were effectively excluded. She was a founding member of London’s Royal Academy in 1768. Her Self-Portrait of 1787 entered the Uffizi’s celebrated collection of artists’ self-portraits. That public recognition helps explain why she became a model for later generations of women painters. Museum source.

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Self-Portrait, painted by hand

Angelica Kauffman · oil on canvas, made to order

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11. Anna Ancher

1859 to 1935Danish painter · Start with Sunshine in the Blue Room

Ancher made light the event in ordinary rooms. In Sunshine in the Blue Room, sunshine enters through a window and spreads across color, furniture and a seated child. She belonged to the Skagen painters, but her attention to interiors gives her work a character of its own. The modest subject holds the eye because the light never feels still. Museum source.

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Sunlight in the Blue Room, painted by hand

Anna Ancher · oil on canvas, made to order

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12. Paula Modersohn-Becker

1876 to 1907German modernist · Start with Self-Portrait with Two Flowers

Modersohn-Becker made self-portraits that changed the way women could appear in modern art. In her 1907 painting, she faces the viewer directly with flowers lifted in one hand. The strong simplified forms give the figure presence without idealizing her. Her career was short, but her experiments with the body and self-image have become central to accounts of early modernism. Museum source.

Questions about female painters

Who is the most famous female painter? There is no single objective answer. Frida Kahlo and Georgia O’Keeffe are among the most widely recognized today, while Artemisia Gentileschi, Mary Cassatt and Berthe Morisot are central names in accounts of earlier painting. Fame changes with exhibitions, teaching and public interest.

Who were famous female Renaissance painters? Sofonisba Anguissola is one of the best documented. Her portraits and court career show that women made significant work even when major commissions and training routes were difficult to access.

Which female painters were Impressionists? Berthe Morisot and Mary Cassatt exhibited with the Impressionists. Anna Ancher worked in a different Nordic setting, though light was equally important to her paintings.

Who was an early female abstract painter? Hilma af Klint made large abstract paintings in the early twentieth century. Her work is now central to discussions of abstraction’s history, though it followed a spiritual project rather than the same public exhibition path as other modernists.

Are all these artists represented by ByMuseum products? No. The catalogue panels appear only for works ByMuseum currently offers. For modern works outside the catalogue, the links lead to the relevant museum.