Women of the Grand Tour: Travel, Space, and Representation of Women in Eighteenth-Century Grand Tour Portraiture

Authors

Anne Totten, Brigham Young University
Dr. Martha Peacock, Brigham Young University

Keywords

Grand Tour, Italian Renaissance, art, architecture, women

College

Humanities

Department

Comparative Arts and Letters

Abstract

The Grand Tour was a quintessential part of eighteenth-century English culture. A trip that lasted from six months to three years, the purpose of this journey was for young men to supplement their education with exposure to the art and architecture of the Italian Renaissance as well as Ancient Greece and Rome. While the Tour was traditionally traveled by young men, many women also took the journey to the “continent.” The purpose of this project is to explore the experience of eighteenth-century English female travelers during the Grand Tour through artist Pompeo Batoni’s portraits of female grand tourists, and to compare these female travelers’ experience to their male counterparts through the medium of portraiture.

Recommended Citation

Totten, Anne and Peacock, Dr. Martha (2019) "Women of the Grand Tour: Travel, Space, and Representation of Women in Eighteenth-Century Grand Tour Portraiture," Journal of Undergraduate Research: Vol. 2019: Iss. 2019, Article 76.
Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jur/vol2019/iss2019/76