But shortly after it was released, the nudity was said to be 'embarrassing' to another of Michelangelo's descendants, and so he commissioned for the breasts to be painted over and disguised by swirling veils and drapery.
As of this year, a project has begun to unmask the original artwork. A team of restorers in Florence are currently using modern technology to create a digital replica of the original, to be displayed in September 2023.
This is an important, even essential, project. Gentileschi was an incredible artist, and the first woman to be admitted into the Accademia, an elite club of artists, and her painting appearing in such a series reflects a remarkable breakthrough into the male-dominated artistic world.
The nudity on display represents a celebration of the female body, and to simply cover it up for the sake of modesty is deplorable. Artworks don't exclusively exist for aesthetic reasons, they have historical and cultural significance in telling us about the past and the society that produced a certain piece of work. In censoring artwork, you are censoring a piece of history.
There is also the idea that you are censoring the story that the artist was intending to tell when they painted their piece. Gentileschi produced her painting after surviving sexual assault by a fellow artist, and the humiliating high-profile trial that followed. There is the suggestion that in her work, she is trying to reconnect with the female body by placing it in the centre, and making it the focus of attention. Her means of reclamation having been censored does nothing but undermine her values and remove her from the foreground of her own work.
There is no world in which art should be censored. Even in its restoration, the original can only be recreated digitally as to not damage the canvas. This means that this tainted version will forever exist in precedence to Gentileschi's, and this is such a shame, for her to be, once again, belittled and her truth masked for the sake of humility.