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Rosa Bonheur (born Marie-Rosalie Bonheur; 16 March 1822 – 25 May 1899) was a French artist known best as a painter of animals (animalière). She also made sculptures in a realist style. [1]
Rosa Bonheur (born March 16, 1822, Bordeaux, France—died May 25, 1899, Château de By, near Fontainebleau) was a French painter and sculptor famed for the remarkable accuracy and detail of her pictures featuring animals.
- Early Life
- Early Success
- Feminism
- The Horse Fair
- Reception Abroad
- Later Life
- Death and Legacy
- Sources
Marie-Rosalie Bonheur was born to Sophie Marquis and Raimond Bonheur in 1822, the first of four children. Her parents’ marriage was a match between a cultured young lady used to the company of European aristocracy and a man of the people, who would become only a moderately successful artist (though Rosa Bonheur would certainly credit him with raisi...
In 1842, Raymond Bonheur remarried, and the addition of his new wife freed Rosa from taking care of her younger siblings, thereby allowing her more time to paint. By the age of 23, Bonheur was already getting attention for her skilled rendering of animals, and it was not uncommon for her to win awards for her work. She won a medal at the Paris Salo...
Bonheur’s feminism was typical of the time, influenced by both a post-French Revolutionsense of enlightenment and freedom, while also inhibited by a sense of middle class propriety. (Many writers and artists of the time who espoused liberal thinking hypocritically criticized the emancipation of women.) Throughout her life, Bonheur wore men’s clothi...
In 1852, Bonheur painted her most famous work, The Horse Fair, whose enormous scale was unusual for the artist. Inspired by the horse market at Paris’ Boulevard de l’Hôpital,Bonheur looked to the works of Théodore Géricault for guidance when planning its composition. The painting was both a critical and commercial success, as people flooded the gal...
Though she achieved success in her native France, her work was met with even more enthusiasm abroad. In the United States her paintings were collected by railroad magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt (he bequeathed the Horse Fair to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1887), and in England Queen Victoriawas known to be an admirer. As Bonheur did not exhibit ...
Bonheur was able to live comfortably on the income she received from her paintings, and in 1859 she purchased a château at By, close to the forest of Fontainebleau. It was there that she took refuge from the city and was able to cultivate an extensive menagerie from which she could paint. She owned dogs, horses, a variety of birds, pigs, goats, and...
Rosa Bonheur died in 1899, at the age of 77. She left her estate to Anna Klumpke, her companion and biographer. She is buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris alongside Nathalie Micas. Klumpke’s ashes were interred with them when she died in 1945. The successes of the artist’s life were great. In addition to becoming an Officer of the Legion of H...
Dore, Ashton and Denise Brown Hare. Rosa Bonheur: A Life and a Legend. Studio, 1981.Fine, Elsa Honig. Women And Art: A History Of Women Painters And Sculptors From The Renaissance To The 20Th Century. Allanheld & Schram, 1978.“Rosa Bonheur: The Horse Fair.” The Met Museum, www.metmuseum.org/en/art/collection/search/435702.Rosa Bonheur (née Marie-Rosalie) was the oldest of four children, two girls and two boys, born to an idealistic artist father, Oscar-Raymond, and a patient piano teacher mother, Sophie. Interestingly, all four of the children grew to be talented and successful artists.
- French
- March 16, 1822
- Bordeaux, Gironde, France
- May 25, 1899
Rosa Bonheur, born Marie-Rosalie Bonheur, (16 March 1822 – 25 May 1899) was a French artist, an animalière (painter of animals) and sculptor, known for her artistic realism. Her most well-known paintings are Ploughing in the Nivernais, first exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1848, and now at Musée d’Orsay in Paris, and The Horse Fair (in ...
- French
- March 16, 1822
- Bordeaux, France
- May 25, 1899
Oct 18, 2022 · Marie-Rosalie Bonheur was born in Bordeaux on 16 March 1822. The eldest of four children (Auguste, Isidore and Juliette) who all became artists, she was the daughter of the painter Raymond Bonheur and Sophie Marquis, a cultured woman and musician.
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Apr 12, 2024 · Rosa Bonheur was an eminent 19th-century French painter and sculptor renowned for her realistic animal depictions. She achieved widespread recognition with major works such as Ploughing in the Nivernais and The Horse Fair, challenging gender barriers in the art world.
