Part 26

It is difficult to write of Madame Le Brun in outline because her life was so interesting in detail. Though she had many sorrows, there is a halo of romance and a brilliancy of atmosphere about her which marks her as a prominent woman of her day, and her autobiography is charming--it is so alive that one forgets that she is not present, telling her story!

The father of this gifted daughter was an artist of moderate ability and made portraits in pastel, which Elizabeth, in her "Souvenirs," speaks of as good and thinks some of them worthy of comparison with those of the famous Latour. M. Vigée was an agreeable man with much vivacity of manner. His friends were numerous and he was able to present his daughter to people whose acquaintance was of value to her. She was but twelve years old at the time of his death, and he had already so encouraged her talents as to make her future comparatively easy for her.

Elizabeth passed five years of her childhood in a convent, where she constantly busied herself in sketching everything that she saw. She tells of her intense pleasure in the use of her pencil, and says that her passion for painting was innate and never grew less, but increased in charm as she grew older. She claimed that it was a source of perpetual youth, and that she owed to it her acquaintance and friendship with the most delightful men and women of Europe.

While still a young girl, Mlle. Vigée studied under Briard, Doyen, and Greuze, but Joseph Vernet advised her to study the works of Italian and Flemish masters, and, above all, to study Nature for herself--to follow no school or system. To this advice Mme. Le Brun attributed her success.

When sixteen years old she presented two portraits to the French Academy, and was thus early brought to public notice.

When twenty-one she married M. Le Brun, of whom she speaks discreetly in her story of her life, but it was well known that he was of dissipated habits and did not hesitate to spend all that his wife could earn. When she left France, thirteen years after her marriage, she had not so much as twenty francs, although she had earned a million!

She painted portraits of many eminent people, and was esteemed as a friend by men and women of culture and high position. The friendship between the artist and Marie Antoinette was a sincere and deep affection between two women, neither of whom remembered that one of them was a queen. It was a great advantage to the artist to be thus intimately associated with her sovereign lady. Even in the great state picture of the Queen surrounded by her children, at Versailles, one realizes the tenderness of the painter as she lovingly reproduced her friend.

Marie Antoinette desired that Mme. Le Brun should be elected to the Academy; Vernet approved it, and an unusual honor was shown her in being made an Academician before the completion of her reception picture. At that time it was a great advantage to be a member of the Academy, as no other artists were permitted to exhibit their works in the Salon of the Beaux-Arts.

Mme. Le Brun had one habit with which she allowed nothing to interfere, which was taking a rest after her work for the day was done. She called it her "calm," and to it she attributed a large share of her power of endurance, although it lost her many pleasures. She could not go out to dinner or entertain at that hour. The evening was her only time for social pleasures. But when one reads her "Souvenirs," and realizes how many notable people she met in her studio and in evening society, it scarcely seems necessary to regret that she could not dine out!

Mme. Le Brun was at one period thought to be very extravagant, and one of her entertainments caused endless comments. Her own account of it shows how greatly the cost was exaggerated. She writes that on one occasion she invited twelve or fifteen friends to listen to her brother's reading during her "calm." The poem read was the "Voyage du jeune Anacharsis en Grèce," in which a dinner was described, and even the receipts for making various sauces were given. The artist was seized with the idea of improvising a Greek supper.

She summoned her cook and instructed her in what had been read. Among her guests were several unusually pretty ladies, who attired themselves in Greek costumes as nearly as the time permitted. Mme. Le Brun retained the white blouse she wore at her work, adding a veil and a crown of flowers. Her studio was rich in antique objects, and a dealer whom she knew loaned her cups, vases, and lamps. All was arranged with the effect an artist knows how to produce.

As the guests arrived Mme. Le Brun added here and there an element of Grecian costume until their number was sufficient for an effective _tableau vivant_. Her daughter and a little friend were dressed as pages and bore antique vases. A canopy hung over the table, the guests were posed in picturesque attitudes, and those who arrived later were arrested at the door of the supper-room with surprise and delight.

It was as if they had been transported to another clime. A Greek song was chanted to the accompaniment of a lyre, and when the honey, grapes, and other dishes were served _à la Grecque_, the enchantment was complete. The poet recited odes from Anacreon and all passed off delightfully.

The fame of this novel supper was spread over Paris, and marvellous tales were told of its magnificence and its cost. Mme. Le Brun writes: "Some ladies asked me to repeat this pleasantry. I refused for various reasons, and several of them were disturbed by my refusal. Soon a report that the supper had cost me twenty thousand francs was spread abroad. The King spoke of it as a joke to the Marquis of Cubières, who fortunately had been one of the guests and was able to convince His Majesty of the folly of such a story. Nevertheless, the modest sum of twenty thousand at Versailles became forty thousand at Rome; at Vienna the Baroness de Strogonoff told me that I had spent sixty thousand francs for my Greek supper; you know that at Petersburg the price at length was fixed at eighty thousand francs, and the truth is that it cost me about fifteen francs!"

Early in 1789, when the warnings of the horrors about to take place began to be heard, Mme. Le Brun went to Italy. In each city that she visited she was received with great kindness and many honors were shown her. In Florence she was invited to paint her own portrait, to be hung in that part of the Uffizi set apart for the portraits of famous painters. Later she sent the well-known portrait, near that of Angelica Kauffman. It is interesting to read Goethe's comparison of the two portraits.

Speaking of Angelica's first, he writes: "It has a truer tone in the coloring, the position is more pleasing, and the whole exhibits more correct taste and a higher spirit in art. But the work of Le Brun shows more careful execution, has more vigor in the drawing, and more delicate touches. It, has, moreover, a clear though somewhat exaggerated coloring. The Frenchwoman understands the art of adornment--the headdress, the hair, the folds of lace on the bosom, all are arranged with care and, as one might say, _con amore_. The piquant, handsome face, with its lively expression, its parted lips disclosing a row of pearly teeth, presents itself to the beholder's gaze as if coquettishly challenging his admiration, while the hand holds the pencil as in the act of drawing.

"The picture of Angelica, with head gently inclined and a soft, intellectual melancholy pervading the countenance, evinces higher genius, even if, in point of artistic skill, the preference should be given to the other."

Mme. Le Brun found Rome delightful and declared that if she could forget France she should be the happiest of women. She writes of her fellow artist: "I have been to see Angelica Kauffman, whom I greatly desired to know. I found her very interesting, apart from her fine talent, on account of her mind and her general culture.... She has talked much with me during the two evenings I have passed at her house. Her manner is gentle; she is prodigiously learned, but has no enthusiasm, which, considering my ignorance, has not electrified me.... I have seen several of her works; her sketches please me more than her pictures, because they are of a Titianesque color."

Mme. Le Brun received more commissions for portraits than she could find time to paint in the three years she lived in Italy. She tells us: "Not only did I find great pleasure in painting surrounded by so many masterpieces, but it was also necessary for me to make another fortune. I had not a hundred francs of income. Happily I had only to choose among the grandest people the portraits which it pleased me to paint." Her account of her experiences in Italy is very entertaining, but at last the restlessness of the exile overcame her and impelled her to seek other scenes. She went to Vienna and there remained three other years, making many friends and painting industriously until the spirit of unrest drove her to seek new diversions, and she went to Russia.

She was there received with great cordiality and remained six years--years crowded with kindness, labor, honor, attainment, joy, and sorrow. Her daughter was the one all-absorbing passion--at once the joy and the grief of her life. She was so charming and so gifted as to satisfy the critical requirements of her mother's desires. In Petersburg, where the daughter was greatly admired and caressed, the artist found herself a thousand times more happy than she had ever been in her own triumphs.

Mme. Le Brun was so constantly occupied and the need of earning was so great with her, that she was forced to confide her daughter to the care of others when she made her début in society. Thus it happened that the young girl met M. Nigris, whom she afterward married. Personally he was not agreeable to Mme. Le Brun and his position was not satisfactory to her. We can imagine her chagrin in accepting a son-in-law who even asked her for money with which to go to church on his wedding-day! The whole affair was most distasteful, and the marriage occurred at the time of the death of Mme. Le Brun's mother. She speaks of it as a "time devoted to tears."

Her health suffered so much from this sadness that she tried the benefit of change of scene, and went to Moscow. Returning to Petersburg, she determined--in spite of the remonstrances of her friends, and the inducements offered her to remain--to go to France. She several times interrupted her journey in order to paint portraits of persons who had heard of her fame, and desired to have her pictures.

She reached Paris in 1801 and writes thus of her return: "I shall not attempt to express my emotions when I was again upon the soil of France, from which I had been absent twelve years. Fright, grief, joy possessed me, each in turn, for all these entered into the thousand varying sentiments which swept over my soul. I wept for the friends whom I had lost upon the scaffold, but I was about to see again those who remained. This France to which I returned had been the scene of atrocious crimes; but this France was my Native Land!"

But the new régime was odious to the artist, and she found herself unable to be at home, even in Paris. After a year she went to London, and remained in England three years. She detested the climate and was not in love with the people, but she found a compensation in the society of many French families who had fled from France as she had done.

In 1804 Mme. Nigris was in Paris and her mother returned to see her. The young woman was very beautiful and attractive, very fond of society, entirely indifferent to her husband, and not always wise in the choice of her companions. Mme. Le Brun, always hard at work and always having great anxieties, at length found herself so broken in health, and so nervously fatigued that she longed to be alone with Nature, and in 1808 she went to Switzerland. Her letters written to the Countess Potocka at this time are added to her "Souvenirs," and reveal the very best of her nature. Feeling the need of continued repose, she bought a house at Louveciennes, where she spent much time. In 1818 M. Le Brun died, and six years later the deaths of her daughter and her brother left her with no near relative in the world.

For a time she sought distractions in new scenes and visited the Touraine and other parts of France, but though she still lived a score of years, she spent them in Paris and Louveciennes. She had with her two nieces, who cared for her more tenderly than any one had done before. One of these ladies was a portrait painter and profited much by the advice of Mme. Le Brun, who wrote of this period and these friends: "They made me feel again the sentiments of a mother, and their tender devotion diffused a great charm over my life. It is near these two dear ones and some friends who remain to me that I hope to terminate peacefully a life which has been wandering but calm, laborious but honorable."

During the last years of her life the most distinguished society of Paris was wont to assemble about her--artists, litterateurs, savants, and men of the fashionable world. Here all essential differences of opinion were laid aside and all met on common ground. Her "calm" seemed to have influenced all her life; only good feeling and equality found a place near her, and few women have the blessed fortune to be so sincerely mourned by a host of friends as was Elizabeth Vigée Le Brun, dying at the age of eighty-seven.

Mme. Le Brun's works numbered six hundred and sixty portraits--fifteen genre or figure pictures and about two hundred landscapes painted from sketches made on her journeys. Her portraits included those of the sovereigns and royal families of all Europe, as well as the most famous authors, artists, singers, and the learned men in Church and State.

As an artist M. Charles Blanc thus esteems her: "In short, Mme. Le Brun belonged entirely to the eighteenth century--I wish to say to that period of our time which rested itself suddenly at David. While she followed the counsels of Vernet, her pencil had a certain suppleness, and her brush a force; but she too often attempted to imitate Greuze in her later works and she weakened the resemblance to her subjects by abusing the _regard noyé_ (cloudy or indistinct effect). She was too early in vogue to make all the necessary studies, and she too often contented herself with an ingenuity a little too manifest. Without judging her as complacently as the Academy formerly judged her, we owe her an honorable place, because in spite of revolutions and reforms she continued to her last day the light, spiritual, and French Art of Watteau, Nattier, and Fragonard."

VIGRI, CATERINA DE. Lippo Dalmasii was much admired by Malvasia, who not only extols his pictures, but his spirit as well, and represents him as following his art as a religion, beginning and ending his daily work with prayer. Lippo is believed to have been the master of Caterina de Vigri, and the story of her life is in harmony with the influence of such a teacher.

She is the only woman artist who has been canonized; and in the Convent of the Corpus Domini, in Bologna, which she founded, she is known as "La Santa," and as a special patron of the Fine Arts.

Caterina was of a noble family of Ferrara, where she was born in 1413. She died when fifty years old; and so great was the reverence for her memory that her remains were preserved, and may still be seen in a chapel of her convent. There are few places in that ever wonderful Italy of such peculiar interest as this chapel, where sits, clothed in a silken robe, with a crown of gold on the head, the incorrupt body of a woman who died four hundred and forty years ago. The body is quite black, while the nails are still pink. She holds a book and a sceptre. Around her, in the well-lighted chapel, are several memorials of her life: the viola on which she played, and a manuscript in her exquisite chirography, also a service book illuminated by Caterina, and, still more important, one of her pictures, a "Madonna and Child," inserted in the wall on the left of the chapel, which is admirable for the beauty of expression in the face of the Holy Mother.

We cannot trace Caterina's artist life step by step, but she doubtless worked with the same spirit of consecration and prayer as did that Beato whom we call Angelico, in his Florentine convent, a century earlier.

Caterina executed many miniatures, and her easel pictures were not large. These were owned by private families. She is known to us by two pictures of "St. Ursula folding her Robe about her Companions." One is in the Bologna Gallery, the other in the Academy in Venice. The first is on a wooden panel, and was painted when the artist was thirty-nine years old. The Saint is represented as unnaturally tall, the figures of her virgins being very small. The mantle and robe of St. Ursula are of rich brocade ornamented with floral designs, while on each side of her is a white flag, on which is a red cross. The face of the saint is so attractive that one forgets the elongation of her figure. There is a delicacy in the execution, combined with a freedom and firmness of handling fully equal to the standard of her school and time. Many honors were paid to the memory of Caterina de Vigri. She was chosen as the protectress of Academies and Art Institutions, and in the eighteenth century a medal was coined, on which she is represented as painting on a panel held by an angel. How few human beings are thus honored three centuries after death!

VINCENT, MME. See Labille.

VISSCHER, ANNA AND MARIA. These daughters of the celebrated Dutch engraver were known as "the Dutch Muses." They made their best reputation by their etchings on glass, but they were also well known for their writing of both poetry and prose. They were associated with the scholars of their time and were much admired.

VOLKMAR, ANTONIE ELIZABETH CAECILIA. Born in Berlin, 1827. She studied with Schroder in her native city, with L. Cogniet in Paris, and later in Italy. She returned to Berlin, where she painted portraits and genre subjects. Her picture of the "Grandmother telling Stories" is in the Museum of Stettin. Among her works are "An Artist's Travels" a "German Emigrant," and "School Friends."

VONNOH, BESSIE POTTER. Bronze medal, Paris Exposition, 1900; Second Prize at Tennessee Centennial. Honorable mention at Buffalo Exposition, 1901. Member of the National Sculpture Society and National Arts Club. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, 1872.

This sculptor is a pupil of the Art Institute, Chicago. Among her best works are "A Young Mother"; "Twin Sisters"; "His First Journey"; "Girl Reading," etc.

In the _Century Magazine_, September, 1897, Arthur Hoeber wrote: "There were shown at the Society of American Artists in New York, in the Spring of 1896, some statuettes of graceful young womanhood, essentially modern in conception, singularly naïve in treatment, refined, and withal intensely personal.... While the disclosure is by no means novel, Miss Potter makes us aware that in the daily prosaic life about us there are possibilities conventional yet attractive, simple, but containing much of suggestion, waiting only the sympathetic touch to be responsive if the proper chord is struck."

This author also notices the affiliation of this young woman with the efforts of the Tanagra workers, and says: "But if the inspiration of the young woman is evident, her work can in no way be called imitative."

VOS, MARIA. Born in Amsterdam, 1824. Pupil of P. Kiers. Her pictures were principally of still-life, two of which are seen in the Amsterdam Museum.

WAGNER, MARIA DOROTHEA ; family name Dietrich. 1728-1792. The gallery of Wiesbaden has two of her landscapes, as has also the Museum at Gotha. "Der Mühlengrund," representing a valley with a brook and a mill, is in the Dresden Gallery.

WARD, MISS E. This sculptor has a commission to make a statue of G. R. Clark for the St. Louis Exposition.

[_No reply to circular_.]

WARD, HENRIETTA MARY ADA. Gold and silver medals at the Crystal Palace; bronze medal at the Vienna Exposition, 1873. Born in Newman Street, London, when that street and the neighborhood was the quarter in which the then celebrated artists resided. Mrs. Ward was a pupil of the Bloomsbury Art School and of Sak's Academy. Her grandfather, James Ward, was a royal Academician, and one of the best animal painters of England. While Sir Thomas Lawrence lived, Mrs. Ward's father, who was a miniaturist, was much occupied in copying the works of Sir Thomas on ivory, as the celebrated portrait painter would permit no other artist to repeat them. After the death of Sir Thomas, Mr. Ward became an engraver. Her mother was also a miniature painter. Her great-uncles were William Ward, R.A., and George Morland; John Jackson, R.A., was her uncle; and her husband, Edward M. Ward, to whom she was married at sixteen, was also a Royal Academican.

From 1849, Mrs. Ward exhibited at the Royal Academy during thirty years, without a break, but her husband's death caused her to omit some exhibitions, and since that time her exhibits have been less regular. For some years Mrs. Ward has had successful classes for women at Chester Studios, which have somewhat interfered with her painting.

Mrs. Ward's subjects have been historical and genre, some of which are extensively known by prints after them. Among these are "Joan of Arc," "Palissy the Potter," and "Mrs. Fry and Mary Saunderson visiting Prisoners at Newgate," the last dedicated by permission to Queen Victoria. This picture was purchased by an American.

Of her picture of "Mary of Scotland, giving her infant to the Care of Lord Mar," Palgrave wrote: "This work is finely painted, and tells its tale with clearness." Among her numerous works are: "The Poet Hogg's First Love"; "Chatterton," the poet, in the Muniment Room, Bristol; "Lady Jane Grey refusing the Crown of England"; "Antwerp Market"; "Queen Mary of Scots' farewell to James I."; "Washing Day at the Liverpool Docks"; "The Princes in the Tower"; "George III. and Mrs. Delayney, with his family at Windsor"; "The Young Pretender," and many others.

When sixteen Mrs. Ward exhibited two heads in crayon. In 1903, at the Academy, she exhibited "The Dining-room, Kent House, Knightsbridge." Mrs. Ward painted for Queen Victoria two portraits of the Princess Beatrice, and a life-size copy of a portrait of the Duke of Albany. She also painted a portrait of Princess Alice of Albany, who is about to marry Prince Alexander of Teck.

Edward VII. has commissioned this artist to make two copies of the state portrait, painted by S. Luke Fildes, R.A.

Mrs. Ward had two more votes for her admission to the Royal Academy than any other woman of her time has had.

WASSER, ANNA. Born at Zürich, 1676, is notable among the painters of her country. She was the daughter of an artist, and early developed a love of drawing and an unusual aptitude in the study of languages. In painting she was a pupil of Joseph Werner. After a time she devoted herself to miniature painting; her reputation extended to all the German courts, as well as to Holland and England, and her commissions were so numerous that her father began to regard her as a mine of riches. He allowed her neither rest nor recreation, and was even unwilling that she should devote sufficient time to her pictures to finish them properly. Under this pressure of haste and constant labor her health gave way and she became melancholy.

She was separated from her father, and in more agreeable surroundings her health was restored and she resumed her painting. Her father then insisted that she should return to him. On her journey home she had a fall, from the effects of which she died at the age of thirty-four.