Mademoiselle de Villevieille

Who she was

Mademoiselle de Villevieille is a woman of the old Faubourg Saint-Germain nobility who studies painting at the Académie Julian's women's studio and becomes one of Marie's most constant companions from 1879 to 1884. Marie's first description, on 23 July 1879, is "une demoiselle qui vient à l'atelier mais très comme il faut et appartenant par sa famille au grand monde du Faubourg Saint Germain. Sa mère est marquise mais pauvre malheureusement" (085.0578). She lives with her mother "au 5ème rue de Ponthieu" (095.0351).

She is older than the other students. Marie calls her "très mûre" in 1881 (091.0248), writes that she "a bien quarante ans" in December 1881 (094.0097), and a year later gives her age as "entre trente-cinq et... davantage" (095.0350). She plays the piano "comme un ange" (094.0097), is "de très bonne famille", paints in the hope of "gloire peut-être et surtout d'augmenter le petit revenu" (095.0351), and Marie is puzzled that a woman so pretty, gifted and well-born never married (094.0097). Her first name is never given. The mother is called "marquise" in 1879 (085.0578), "la maréchale de Villevieille" in July 1882 (095.0351) and "la comtesse de Villevieille" in January 1883 (097.0380). The diary does not explain the changing styles, and no independent source for the family has been found, so her identity beyond the diary is uncertain.

Marie and Mlle de Villevieille

Atelier friend, 1879 to 1880. (In November 1880 Marie's aunt flies into a fury at the mere name of Mlle de Villevieille, apparently after a remark about Marie's deafness had been repeated to her: 090.0269.) Marie goes with her to see the Prix de Rome competition at the École des Beaux-Arts (085.0578), to the Mirlitons exhibition (087.0439; again 091.0088), and to the Salon on 5 May 1880, where they slip away from Marie's family to find Caillas and Kiriewsky (088.0104). In spring 1880 she admires Marie's large painting and then comes in the afternoons to work beside her at the studio ("au 37"): "Mlle de Villevieille vient l'après-midi travailler avec moi, toute la semaine" (087.0692, 087.0836). On 17 July 1880 she stands a punch for the studio on the news that Julian's favourite pupil Doucet has won the Prix de Rome (089.0177), and on 12 November 1880 she accompanies Marie to the Dominican house in the Faubourg Saint-Honoré, whose entrance proves unsuitable for the monk-expulsion picture (090.0213).

The Atelier picture, 1881. She is, with Alice Brisbane, one of Marie's two "principaux modèles et complaisants à l'infini" for the large picture of the Julian studio (091.0088); Marie cannot get the ladder behind her head to line up after Julian's perspective ruling (091.0112, 091.0131), and on 7 March Julian explains Marie's faults as a painter to Villevieille in Marie's presence, which wounds her (091.0272). On 12 February Villevieille comes back at three o'clock to congratulate Julian on his decoration, and goes down with Marie to see the flowers sent to the "Directeur décoré" (091.0120, 091.0121). It is Villevieille who brings the fourteen-year-old daughter of the baritone Maurel to sit for Marie in May 1881: Portrait of the little Maurel (092.0024).

The loan, March 1881. On 6 March 1881 Marie receives "un billet mystérieux de Mme de Villevieille", the mother, who meets her in a cab and, in tears, asks her for money: "c'est la première fois qu'une femme âgée, respectable, en larmes me fait une demande d'argent" (091.0245). The sum is six hundred francs in one paragraph and five thousand in another (091.0253, 091.0269). Marie, who has just paid Julian and has her own commitments (including shares in the feminist paper La Citoyenne), is shaken, hurt "de perdre la considération qu'on avait pour les gens", and finds it hard to face the daughter at the studio next morning (091.0260). The mother promises support through the embassy, but Marie does not count on it (091.0256). On 15 March: "Voici la lettre de Mme de Villevieille. Tout est arrangé. Il ne m'en reste qu'un peu de dégoût" (091.0297).

The Salon medals, 1881. On 14 May 1881 she brings Marie a blow from Julian: Breslau would get a reward, and Julian had tried for both women, "mais que moi ça ne prend pas"; Marie is touched that both Julian and she thought she might hope (091.0622, 091.0623). On 29 July she and others assure Marie that, counting the years each has worked, she is more remarkable than Breslau (092.0348). During Marie's illness in the winter she visits, and with Alice brings news of the atelier (094.0029, 094.0037, 094.0049, 094.0074); on 19 December she dines and plays the piano (094.0097).

Pianist and friend of the house, 1882 to 1883. Julian comes to see "la tête de Villevieille" at Marie's on 23 July 1882, and she goes with Marie to look at the Prix de Rome and to the couturier Laferrière (095.0325, 095.0367). On 31 December 1882 Marie agrees with her about the sculptor Saint-Marceaux (097.0323). She and her mother call on 6 January 1883, in the days after Gambetta's death (097.0380). When the Salon's lists come out on 25 March 1883 she is the one who comes to ask Marie whether she has news, and Julian's careless remark in the atelier that he does not know whether Marie's picture was accepted reaches Marie through her (098.0565, 098.0590, 098.0592, 098.0605).

Intruder at the easel, 1884. From January 1884 she and Claire Canrobert come to Marie's studio every day to paint (102.0643, 103.0074). Marie writes that she is irritated by their brushes and chatter and by Villevieille's ignorance: "Villevieille est assez ignorante comme la plupart des femmes du monde, et pleine d'idées absurdes" (103.0075), and Marie ends up painting much of Villevieille's picture for her ("je fais presque tout le corsage de la bonne femme de Villevieille", 103.0315; "cette vieille et affreuse Villevieille ne peut pas en sortir de son tableau", 103.0348). On 31 May she brings the news that the jury did not give Marie a medal "parce que j'ai fait du tapage pour la mention de l'année dernière" and called the jury idiots aloud (104.0471). On 30 July Marie records that she has made Claire a similar offer of help with her picture, as she did "à Bojidar et à Villevielle", and hopes to be free of them once the pictures are done (105.0367).

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