I wish I could say my earlier struggle was a case of a memory lapse, but I know that I wouldn’t as easily forget Caravaggio, Bernini, or Canaletto. I am oddly relieved to open on page 39 and see a piece by the Baroque artist I recognise – Artemisia Gentileschi’s Judith Slaying Holofernes (1612). Once back at home, I open Hessel’s book in hope of scratching this brain itch. What about that 17th-century Baroque artist my mum once mentioned? My mind goes entirely blank. In an attempt to diversify his examples beyond white British women, I add Frida Kahlo, Tamara de Lempicka, Yayoi Kusama … Then I force myself to name any earlier female artists, but I stall at the late-19th century painter Berthe Morisot. “That’s impossible,” my friend protests – shocked at discovering Gombrich’s exclusion of female artists from the canon and suggesting: “the people who have read only Gombrich probably don’t know much about art to begin with.” He proceeds to prove his point by listing Tracey Emin, Barbara Hepsworth, and Bridget Riley. “We weren’t taught to remember the women” (Fun fact: thinking I’ve never seen or heard about her, I discover that it was Kollwitz’s handprint, taken in 1925 by Marianne Raschig, that was on the promotional materials for The Human Touch Fitzwilliam Museum exhibition in 2021.) I explain that it is a feminist reworking of Ernst Gombrich’s catalogue of the history of art, The Story of Art (1950), which even in its most recent edition, only includes one woman, the German artist Käthe Kollwitz – one step away from The Story of Art Without Women becoming a scarily fitting title. So when an acquaintance of mine enters the shop wondering what to buy for his mother, I automatically mention Hessel’s book. We also have a general Q&A thread where we answer your questions about art history.Working as a Heffers bookseller, I often find myself recommending Katy Hessel’s The Story of Art Without Men, the Waterstones Book of the Year, to customers.

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Ernst gombrich the story of art