the way a wider range of women, inspired by the model of the bluestockings, created a public 'profile' for themselves. Portraits of the artist Angelica Kauffman (1741-1807), historian Catharine Macaulay (1731-91) and early 'feminist' Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-97), reveal how women used portraiture to advance their work and reputations in a period which begins with the Enlightenment and ends with the onset of the French Revolution.Although the bluestockings made a substantial contribution to the creation and definition of a national culture, their intellectual participation and artistic interventions have largely been forgotten. Brilliant Women: 18th-Century Bluestockings reveals the history and significance of bluestockings and their culture.