The Modernist: Suzanne Valadon
Suzanne Valadon was a French artist; she was born on
September 23rd 1865 in Bessineess, France. She died at the age of 72
on April 7th, 1938 in Paris, France. Valadon’s father was unknown
and her mother worked as a sewing maid. At the time of Valadon’s birth women in
society were struggling with their identity and the fight for their own
independent rights. Women during this period were confined to the household and
it was expected that they marry into wealth and status. The French constitution
of 1792 banned women from public life, thus their limitations to the household.
The Emperor Napaleon’s civil code of 1804 denied women their legal rights and
access to divorce to married women. Women’s property and income were under the
control of their husbands. In the nineteenth century the idea of feminism was
slowly appearing in France. The French established a suffrage movement. The
movement was not very successful due to the lack of support from the Republican
Politicians. The road to success was not a straight and easy one for Suzanne Valadon;
she was not born in to art or hadn’t known that art was her calling. During
Valadon’s younger years women who were seeking a career in fine arts were restricted
in their opportunities in receiving education on fine arts. Admittance to fine
arts schools was limited to mostly white men and the wealthy. Women weren’t
allowed to receive free training until 1897. At this time Valadon
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| Suzanne Valadon |
was 32 years old.
During Valadon’s teenage years she became friends with some
young artist who helped her get a job as an acrobat at the Mollier circus. Her
life at the circus opened new doors for her. It was at the Mollier circus
Suzanne Valadon was introduced to Berthe Morisot. Morisot painted her as a
tightrope walker. In 1880 Valadon had a misfortunate accident that prevented
her from performing at the circus and so her career as an acrobat was over.
Valadon encountered the Painter Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, and her career as
an artist model began. In the time period in which she lived in women,
especially middle class women were not permitted to being artist. They were
subjected to the attention of the male white artist. They were the objects that
he painted for the pleasure of his male audience. Valadon was criticized in
having numerous affairs with many well-known artists. She was considered to be a
high-spirited, vivacious woman. In 1883 she gave birth to her son Maurice
Utrillo, who is now a well-known painter. It is presumed, with great skepticism
that his father was Miguel Utrillo. It was her career as a model that
influenced Valadon to become an artist and painter. She observed the techniques
that the skillful artists used when painting her and she taught herself how to
paint. Suzanne Valadon is mostly self taught.
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| Self Portrait, 1883 |
Valadon’s first known pieces were Self Portrait, 1883 and The
Grandmother. A close friend of hers and also a painter Edgar Degas
recognized her talents and encouraged her to continue painting and drawing.
Degas purchased a few pieces of her works and helped her to get her career as
an artist started. It was because of Degas’s persistent and support that Valadon’s
earned a show at The Societe Nationale des Beaux Arts. Suzanne Valadon was the
first woman to show at The Societe Nationale des Beaux Arts. All of Valadon’s
earlier work were done in pastel or drawn in pencil; it wasn’t until 1893 that
she started working with oils. Her marriage to Paul Mousis in 1896 enabled her
to quit her modeling career and dedicate her self fully to her artistic career.
Her husband was a wealthy stockbroker and she no longer had financial barriers
that prevented her from pursuing her career as an artist.
Previous to the twentieth century women were portrayed in
art as the wanton. They were exploited sexually and were often portrayed with
the perfect body and the perfect expression and the perfect pose, perfect in
the perception of the male viewer.
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| Grandmother and Young Girl Stepping into the Bath c. 1908 |
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| The Blue Room, 1923 |
In the Blue Room, 1923
Valadon portrayed a woman in a state of relaxation. The figure in the painting
is a full figured woman who is portrayed as confident and in a state of
absolute relaxation. The woman is self-absorbed, she isn’t conscious of the
male gaze, because she isn’t subject to the male gaze. As in many of her other pieces, the woman's head is turned away from the viewer. Men are not welcoming to
the idea of the modernist woman. The modern woman has no sexual appeal to the
male viewer and so the subjects in Valadon’s paining are not posing for the
male viewer's pleasure, they are making a statement about their identity and
their equality.
The shift from seductiveness and sexual femininity to
natural femininity created an anti-feminist backlash. Modernist didn’t follow
the rules of painting with perception, color and a sense of order. Modernist painted
on visions, the way they perceived the world. It is argued that the modernist
painter abandoned intellect for intuition. The modernist does not paint the
perfect picture; they paint the “real” picture according to their perception of reality.
Works Cited
Chadwick, Whitney. "Modernist Representation: The Female Body." Women, Art, and Society. 4th ed.New York: Thames and Hudson, 1990. Print.
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