Her Idea, His Glory
- Utopia 500
- 3 days ago
- 6 min read
Updated: 2 days ago
“Why are there no famous female artists?” is a commonly asked question, but the answer has more to do with men than women. The cases of men stealing or getting credit for art that female artists created are, unfortunately, more than we believe. This pattern is more often recognized in marriages or relationships, but not limited to them.
Margarete Steffin
One of the most well-known examples of this narrative comes from the notorious scriptwriter Brecht, who is known for building his success on stolen work, specifically, his lovers’ labour. He tricked many women by seducing them and making false promises of a relationship and marriage in exchange for their work. Many women, such as Marieluise Fleißer, Elisabeth Hauptmann, Ruth Berlau, and, most importantly, Margarete Steffin, were victims of his toils.
The last one wrote eight of the most well-known plays, including “Mother Courage and Her Children”, “The Caucasian Chalk Circle” and “Life of Galileo”. This can be proven by the fact that the writing style on the original manuscripts matches hers, but she never claimed them.
Even though Margarete's family came from the middle class, she excelled in the linguistic department. She attended Russian lessons and read French books to continue her education independently. We can assume that she was a person whose work was worthy, but not celebrated, given that she only published a few poems, letters and tales. Clearly, despite her intelligence and her talent, the promise of a future marriage and the fake engagement ring he gave her made her very gullible to his word.
We humans often are blind to imperfections because of love. In this case, Bertolt Brecht took advantage of their love and tried to fool those women. To this day, we praise this man who mentally harmed so many people and became famous using stolen art, and unfortunately, he is not the only one.
Zelda Fitzgerald
Similarly with Brecht’s plays, the book “The Beautiful and the Damned”, written allegedly by F. Scott Fitzgerald, writer of “The Great Gatsby”, has faced a lot of criticism regarding the fact that many parts plagiarised his wife’s, Zelda Fitzgerald, diary and work. She dared to stand up for herself, and she called him out publicly and revealed the truth in a critique she wrote about the book.
Her review of this book said:
“It seems to me that on one page I recognized a portion of an old diary of mine which mysteriously disappeared shortly after my marriage, and also scraps of letters which, though considerably edited, sound to me vaguely familiar.”
After that, she attracted more and more fame, so she decided to write her own book, an autobiography about her life, and sent it to her husband’s publisher. This caused F. Scott Fitzgerald to react because he wanted to publish a book using the same material as hers. Both books came out, but her husband’s success and fame overshadowed Zelda’s.
Zelda was called the original “flapper girl” of her time; her talent and character were memorable. Both of their continuous affairs allegedly strained the marriage between her and F. Scott. This caused many psychological issues for her, which, simultaneously with her symptoms of schizophrenia, drove her into a challenging mental state of depression.
Taking into account the fact that “Save me a Waltz” was published in 1932, when women’s rights were limited and the women then weren’t as independent as we are today, and that she had to get treatment for schizophrenia, it seems as if they didn’t take her seriously because of her gender and her mental state, and this is the case for Florence Deeks as well.
Florence Deeks
Florence was a writer too. She wrote “The Web of the World’s Romance”, and she tried to get it published by sending the manuscript to Macmillan of Canada in 1918. The company kept it for more than six months. Two years later, the same publishing company, but in New York, came out with a very similar book named “The Outline of History” by H.G. Wells. When Florence became aware of this book, she tried to sue Wells for plagiarism, but she was ridiculed and shamed by the Count House.
The differences in this case are apparent. First of all, her position as a female author got her great work rejected, but when a man proposed something similar, it was acceptable and praised. Secondly, even when she tried to get justice using proof, she was humiliated. Fortunately, in later years, we can see that it got better, but this unfairness is still present now. The story of Margaret Keane, however, has a very different and more hopeful ending.
Margaret Keane
The painter, Margaret Keane, is known for her portraits of people with huge eyes. She became one of the most prominent painters in the ‘60s and continues to be one of them even after her death. Her style has influenced many people to this day, including but not limited to the designer of the Powerpuff Girls.
She trusted her husband to become her art dealer, so he “helped” her with the sales of her painting, but secretly he claimed them as his, leading to him getting the credits for her art and the money. After their divorce, Margaret tried to sue him for stealing her work. During the court, the judge asked both of them to paint with this art style in front of everyone, where, obviously, Margaret did a terrific job, leading her to win the case and 4.000.000 dollars in 1989. Most importantly for her and for every woman after her, she got justice and credit for her hard work, giving hope to other female artists.
Her empowering story became an inspiration and gave courage for other artists, women or men, to reclaim their work and speak up for themselves. At the same time, the social aspect between 1920 (Florence Deeks’ case) and 1989 (Margaret Keane’s case), hints the change that came with all the effort from activists, for bettering the social, political and economic state of women, such as having the right to vote, the second feminist wave and the first woman president in the UK.
Frida Kahlo
The same narrative can be observed in Frida Kahlo’s case, too. In 2025, she is clearly the most renowned Mexican artist, but the case was very different when she was alive. She married her husband, Diego Rivera, who was exceptional for his time and was under his shadow while they were both alive. Her artistic call was clear from the beginning of her life, when she would notice little things that other people couldn’t and she implemented them into her art pieces.
With the feminist movement, she got the recognition she deserved, even though it was after her passing, in the ‘70s and ’80s. Her story is different from the others because of the lack of malicious acts or stealing, but because of her position as a woman, she was still obviously undermined.
Judith Leyster
With reference to Judith Leyster, a painter mistreated by her art dealers, who forged the signature of another male painter with a similar art style on her work, it is obvious that this pattern is not limited only to marriages. It can also be recognized in workspaces, where less qualified men are credited for their female colleagues’ work.
“Nobody says Picasso, the male artist”
When people talk about artists, they usually mean male artists, and they separate the women by calling them female artists. This fuels the idea of the nonexistence of women in art fields and informs the idea that they aren’t capable of making art. In her effort to explain the obscured situation of the extensive use of “female” artist, Patti Smith said in an interview:
“As an artist, I never wanted to be fettered by gender nor recognized or defined as a female poet, musician or singer. They don’t do that with men—nobody says Picasso, the male artist”.
This ideology is the root of this “stollentelling” pattern. If society had understood that women are as capable and as talented as men, many of these cases would have probably been avoided.
There are many other female artists from different art fields, like script writers, sculptors (Camille Claude), painters (Sofonisba Anguissola, Artemisia Gentileschi, Caroline Louisa Daly), authors (Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette), etc, who have experienced this unfair treatment and lack of recognition. They come from different places and centuries, but they all face the same problem. Maybe it is time to change this situation and give gender equality a chance in art and in life in general.
Bibliography
Baltic Sea Library. (n.d.). Steffin, Margarete.
Court of Appeal for Ontario (1931). Deeks v. Wells
Gayá, C. (2021). Zelda Fitzgerald: The Writer Plagiarized by Her Husband F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Google Arts & Culture. (n.d.). Defining Frida Kahlo's Place In Art History.
Iannacci, E. (October 6th, 2015). Patti Smith on the pathos and passion behind her latest writing.
Jamrin, E. (2024). Remarkable Women Writers and Artists Whose Work Was Stolen by Men.
KEANE EYES GALLERY. (n.d.). ABOUT MARGARET.
Morris, R. C. (2008). Acknowledging, finally, the work of women artists.
Plate, L. (2011). Women’s Rewriting as Counter-memory: An ABC of ‘Stolentelling’(Authorship, Branding, and Copyright). In Transforming Memories in Contemporary Women’s Rewriting (pp. 66-93). London: Palgrave Macmillan UK.
tabitharandlett1 (2025). Zelda Fitzgerald.
tabitharandlett1 (2025). Margarete Steffin.
Tenzler, E. (2025). The theft of women’s art.
Tsaleza, A. (2025). 5 Women Artists Whose Works Were Misattributed to Men.
Written by Ioanna Tzarou