Art is a Tyrant: The Unconventional Life of Rosa Bonheur

by Catherine Hewitt

Overview

WINNER OF THE FRANCO-BRITISH SOCIETY LITERARY AWARD 2020

'Art is a Tyrant recounts [Bonheur's] life with no little brio.' Michael Prodger, The Times Books of the Year 2020

'[A] diligently researched, beautifully produced and insistently sympathetic biography.' Kathryn Hughes, Guardian

A new biography of the wildly unconventional 19th-century animal painter and gender equality pioneer Rosa Bonheur, from the author of the acclaimed Mistress of Paris and Renoir's Dancer.

Rosa Bonheur was the very antithesis of the feminine ideal of 19th-century society. She was educated, she shunned traditional 'womanly' pursuits, she rejected marriage - and she wore trousers. But the society whose rules she spurned accepted her as one of their own, because of her genius for painting animals.

She shared an intimate relationship with the eccentric, self-styled inventor Nathalie Micas, who nurtured the artist like a wife. Together Rosa, Nathalie and Nathalie's mother bought a chateau and with Rosa's menagerie of animals the trio became one of the most extraordinary households of the day.

Catherine Hewitt's compelling new biography is an inspiring evocation of a life lived against the rules.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781785786211
Publisher:	Amberley Publishing
Publication date:	02/06/2020
Pages:	448
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.80(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Catherine Hewitt studied at the Courtauld Institute of Art. Her previous books with Icon are The Mistress of Paris (2015), 'an enthralling story, told with both conviction and sympathy' (Observer), and Renoir's Dancer (2017), described as 'fascinating' by France magazine.

Table of Contents

Prologue ix

1 Two Houses 1

2 Where Angels Fear 19

3 Hear the People 31

4 Trying for Size 47

5 Beasts and Benefactors 61

6 True Nature 77

7 Life and Death 93

8 Cometh the Hour 111

9 Changing Views 129

10 A Woman's Work 149

11 Beyond the Sea 163

12 The Lady of the Lakes 173

13 Such Stuff as Dreams 189

14 Pure Invention 203

15 All That Glitters 213

16 Gathering Storms 227

17 Knowing the Enemy 239

18 Standing Out from the Pack 261

19 The Call of the Wild 275

20 Mastering the Moon 287

21 A Question of Pride 303

22 The Price of Fame 315

23 The Final Awakening 327

24 Against the Odds 345

25 Four Loves 361

26 Signing a Life 381

Epilogue 401

Afterword 411

Acknowledgements 419

Select Bibliography 423

Notes 427

Index 473