Women of the domestic service in the European painting of the XVIII and XIXth

Abstract

Close to the artistic dimension the European painting possesses a documentary value, turning into a modal for the historical study of the society. Under the patronazgo of the elites of power, the painters of the old continent have dedicated their works to the political, religious or mythological subject matter. Nevertheless, from the modern centuries, with the increasing protagonism of the bourgeois class, the painting kind would receive great summit turning the domestic area into a new artistic scene. In the above mentioned enclave, in enclosed which the daily objects are worth being represented, there justifies itself the presence of the women of the domestic service. Servants who are employed at the different tasks of the home, wetnurses and governesses who raise and educate, respectively, the children of the family to which they serve, constitute the whole world of social relations of which a good testimony offers the painting of the xviiith and xixth century.