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Worldvisitguide > Louise Abbéma
Louise Abbéma
Louise Abbéma
Born in : Étampes - 1858 / Dead in : Paris, 1927
Louise Abbéma, a French painter and designer, began painting in her early teens, and studied under such notables of the period as Charles Chaplin, Jean-Jacques Henner and Carlus-Duran. She first received recognition for her work at 18 when she painted a portrait of Sarah Bernhardt, her life-long friend, and many believe, her lover.

Biography   
She went on to paint portraits of other contemporary notables, and also painted panels and murals which adorned the Paris Town Hall, the Paris Opera House, numerous theatres including the Theatre Sarah Bernhardt, and the Palace of the Colonial Governor at Dakar, Senegal. She was a regular exhibitor at the Paris Salon, where she received an honorable mention for her panels in 1881. Abbéma was also among the female artists whose works were exhibited in the Women's Building at the 1893 World Columbian Exposition in Chicago. A bust Sarah Bernhardt sculpted of Abbéma was also exhibited at the exposition.

Abbéma specialized in oil portraits and watercolors, and many of her works showed the influence from Chinese (Chinoiserie) and Japanese (Japonism) painters, as well as contemporary masters such as Édouard Manet.

She frequently depicted flowers in her works. Among her best known are The Seasons, April Morning, Among the Flowers, Winter, and portraits of Emperor Don Pedro of Brazil, Ferdinand de Lesseps, and Charles Garnier.

Abbéma was also an accomplished printmaker, sculptor, and designer, as well as a writer who made regular contributions to the journals Gazette des Beaux-Arts and L'Art.

Among the many honors conferred upon Abbéma was nomination as official painter of the Third Republic. She was also awarded a bronze medal at the 1900 Exposition Universelle and in 1906 was inducted into the Légion d'Honneur.

Abbéma died in Paris in 1927.

At the end of the 20th century, as contributions by women to the arts in past centuries receives more critical and historical attention, her works are enjoying a renewed popularity.

From Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louise_Abb%C3%A9ma
Text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License

Friend of Charles Émile Auguste Durand (Carolus-Duran) and Henriette Rosine Bernard (Sarah Bernhardt)
Achievement   
Carnavalet Museum
Artist
Jeanne Samary (1857-1890), sociétaire de la Comédie-Française
Painting
Louise Abbéma
Elégante place de la Concorde
Painting
Louise Abbéma
(approx. from 1894 to 1895)
Louise Abbéma

Charles Émile Auguste Durand (Carolus-Duran)
Henriette Rosine Bernard (Sarah Bernhardt)