Tomb of Marie Bashkirtseff (Passy)

Overview

Marie Bashkirtseff lies in a stone funerary chapel in the cimetière de Passy (2 rue du Commandant-Schloesing, Paris 16e, division 11). It was designed by Émile Bastien-Lepage, the architect brother of the painter Jules Bastien-Lepage, and built within a year or two of her death on 31 October 1884. It is a domed building of Byzantine inspiration with a stained-glass window, an upper room fitted out as a corner of her studio, and a vault below. The French Wikipedia article on the cemetery calls it the "imposante chapelle funéraire" that dominates the cemetery from outside, its silhouette visible at the start of the avenue Paul-Doumer (fr.wikipedia.org, "Cimetière de Passy"); the Pall Mall Gazette (1892) places it "close to the entrance". Wikipedia and the Pall Mall Gazette alike present the upper room as a studio rather than a conventional chapel.

What Marie asked for

The chapel realises, in its own way, a wish Marie wrote down fourteen months before she died. On 21 August 1883, imagining her death at thirty-six or thirty-seven, she dictates her will to the diary: it "se bornera à une statue et une peinture de Saint-Marceaux et de Jules. Dans une chapelle à Paris, entourée de fleurs, dans un endroit apparent, et à chaque anniversaire on y chantera des messes de Verdi et de Pergolèse et d'autres musiques à chaque anniversaire et à perpétuité, par les plus célèbres chanteurs" (101.0226). The two artists are Saint-Marceaux the sculptor and Jules Bastien-Lepage the painter. A month later she writes "Écrivons mon testament" and, a paragraph on, "C'est fait" (101.0422–0423), without saying what it contains.

The idea of a visible chapel in Paris was not a passing fancy of that August. In Marie's mind a tomb is, like her sculpture and her painting, something to be seen: the work that Saint-Marceaux's Génie gardant le secret de la tombe in the Luxembourg left in her memory, on 1 July 1883, is one of only two she takes home that morning (100.0270). In an entry of early September 1884 she recalls that, when she was talking of "mon enterrement", Émile Bastien-Lepage had told her that he "serait chargé d'exécuter mes dernières volontés" (105.0751). He was the man who afterwards built the chapel.

Marie's own phrases ("une chapelle à Paris, entourée de fleurs, dans un endroit apparent") were quoted back in the Pall Mall Gazette's account of the monument, which says that Mme Bashkirtseff had placed the chapel "close to the entrance" of the cemetery, in "the 'chapel in Paris, surrounded by flowers, in a conspicuous place,' dreamt of by Marie the year before her death" (as reprinted in Kernberger 2013, Appendix V, "Marie's Funeral & Thereafter"; an Australian newspaper reprinted it in January 1892). The statue and painting by Saint-Marceaux and Jules that she asked for are not recorded in any source seen here: Jules Bastien-Lepage died on 10 December 1884, six weeks after Marie, and no work by either man for the chapel is mentioned in the descriptions found. Whether the Verdi and Pergolesi masses were ever sung is likewise not recorded.

Who built it, and when

The architect was Émile Bastien-Lepage (1854–1938). Kernberger (2013, Appendix V; Chronology) states that he designed the mausoleum and, with his brother, planned the funeral; the Wikimedia Commons description of the monument names him as creator, and the Musée Carnavalet's record for Benn's painting of the grave (inv. P2395, 1985) says the same. Colette Hélard-Cosnier, in her essay on Marie's tombs (Tombeaux et monuments, Presses universitaires de Rennes, 1993, pp. 113–119, online at books.openedition.org/pur/33346), agrees. No source seen names a sculptor, a glazier or a builder.

The dates are not settled. The Commons description gives November 1884 to April 1885; Kernberger (2013, Chronology) says the coffin was interred at Passy in April 1885 and that the mausoleum was finished during that year; Hélard-Cosnier (1993) gives 1886. The year of Marie's death is thus certain, the year of completion is 1885 or 1886, and the sources do not say which.

What it looks like

The exterior, as shown in the photographs on this page, is of pale limestone, with a low dome, slender turrets with spires at the corners, a row of three round-arched openings in the upper storey and a round-arched porch with a glazed and barred door. Hélard-Cosnier describes a Byzantine dome topped by an Orthodox cross, and has no liking for it: "massif, laid, prétentieux" (1993). A tall wrought-iron cross stands on the dome in the 1926 press photograph (Agence Meurisse, Wikimedia Commons). The decoration is about painting. On the gable end a wreath of painters' palettes surrounds the arched panel that carries the name; palm branches are carved on the front; a leaded window above the door shows a lyre between floral scrolls (photograph by Thomon, Commons, 2021).

Three inscriptions can be read from outside:

Inside

The building has two levels, "the basement or vault, and a chapel above" (Pall Mall Gazette, reprinted in Kernberger 2013, Appendix V). An ordinary visitor sees the upper room only through the glass door. At the time of that account it was "fitted up like a corner of the studio": her chair, a little table, half a dozen favourite books, an easel and palette (Hélard-Cosnier adds the easel and palette), the titles of her paintings in gold on the walls, and the verses "written by Coppée and several of his brother poets". A short flight of marble steps led down to the vault, where the sarcophagus stood, and opposite it hung a life-size oil portrait of Marie, with a lamp kept burning before the flower-covered bier. The sacristan told the writer that the chapel and its fittings had cost about a hundred thousand francs, "as much as a villa", and that Mme Bashkirtseff spent much of her time there when she was in Paris (the figure is the sacristan's, unverified).

Later descriptions differ. Kernberger's caption for the interior (2013, Appendix V, after Tatiana Shvets, Marie Bashkirtseff, l'élue du destin, Moscow, Vetche) names marble busts of Marie's mother (left) and father (right) and an unfinished large picture, her last, Les Saintes Femmes au tombeau. Hélard-Cosnier mentions a portrait of Marie on her deathbed. The 2021 photograph on this page does show two busts on marble pedestals, an armchair, a table with a cross and a statuette, and a large dark painting on the back wall, but the subject of the painting cannot be read in the glass. The sketches of Les Saintes Femmes that survive in the 1885 catalogue are small (no. 60, 61, 93), and the project's page for the work records that its present whereabouts are unknown; a large unfinished canvas in the chapel is therefore reported, not confirmed.

Who lies there

The Commons description of the monument lists four people: Marie Bashkirtseff (1858–1884); her aunt, Nadine Stepanovna Babanine, wife of Romanoff (Ma tante); and the ashes of her mother, Marie Stepanovna Babanine (Maman, 1833–1920), and of her niece, Marie Pavlovna Bashkirtseff. The niece's parentage is not given there; the patronymic Pavlovna suggests a daughter of Marie's brother Paul, but that is an inference. No source seen gives the date of the aunt's death or of the later burials.

Status, condition and visiting

English Wikipedia says that the monument "has been declared a historic monument by the government of France", but marks the sentence "citation needed" (en.wikipedia.org, "Marie Bashkirtseff", checked 2026-10-11), and tourism pages repeat it. This could not be confirmed. The French Wikipedia list of the monuments historiques of the 16th arrondissement, which is compiled from the Mérimée register, has no entry for the Passy cemetery or for this tomb (checked 2026-10-11), and the Wikidata item for the grave carries no heritage designation. Until a Mérimée/POP record is produced, the protected status should be treated as unproven.

The monument is in the open cemetery and can be visited with the rest of it, in division 11. The 2025 photograph shows a weathered but intact building, with dark staining on the limestone and plants growing at its foot. The state of the interior and the current arrangements for its upkeep were not found. For the cemetery's opening hours, see the City of Paris's page for the cimetière de Passy.

Related entries

Sources