Berthe Morisot
The female pioneer of Impressionism.
Berthe Morisot exhibited at almost all the Impressionist exhibitions. She painted women and children at home with a light, rapid brush.
Berthe Morisot was born in 1841 in Bourges. Her father was a senior civil servant, and the family moved to Paris. According to family tradition she was related to the Rococo painter Fragonard, but the claim is uncertain. She and her sister Edma took painting lessons, and later received advice from Camille Corot, who taught them to paint outdoors. Women were not allowed to study at the École des Beaux-Arts, so they learned through private teachers and by copying in the Louvre. Berthe made her debut at the Salon in 1864.
In 1868 she met Édouard Manet in the Louvre. She sat for him in several paintings, among them The Balcony in the Musée d'Orsay. They influenced each other, and she persuaded him to try lighter colours. In 1874 she married his brother Eugène Manet. The same year she took part in the first Impressionist exhibition with works including The Cradle (1872), now in the Musée d'Orsay. It shows her sister watching over her sleeping child.
Morisot took part in all the Impressionist exhibitions except one, the year her daughter Julie was born. She painted the life available to her as a woman of the bourgeoisie: the home, the garden, women dressing, reading or caring for children. Her brushstrokes are quick, light and slanting, and her colours bright, with a great deal of white. She also painted in watercolour and pastel. Many pictures are so free that they seem almost unfinished.
Eugène Manet supported her career wholeheartedly, and their daughter Julie became her most important subject. Berthe Morisot died in 1895 of pneumonia, which she had contracted while nursing her daughter. She was 54 years old.
For a long time she was seen as a lesser Impressionist, partly because she was a woman. Today she is regarded as one of the group’s foremost members. The Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris has a large collection of her work.