12 Photographs, PORTRAIT OF A LADY, Ady Fidelin, the first black model and muse, by Man Ray, Pablo Picasso and Lee Miller, with Footnotes. #171

MAN RAY (1890-1976)

Ady Fidelin, c. 1936

Silver print

23 x 17.5 cm.

Private collection

Ady Fidelin was born in 1915 in Pointe-à-Pitre into one of Guadeloupe’s oldest Creole families, immigrating to France in the wake of the catastrophic 1928 cyclone that devastated the Caribbean, killing thousands. The death of her mother during this traumatic event and the passing of her father a few years later precipitated her migration to Paris to join family members who had made the passage before her. She arrived in France in one of the successive waves of émigres from the island, lured by the hope of a better life in the storm’s aftermath. 

"Under the lively and cheerful pen of Gisèle Pineau, Ady Fidelin, muse and lover of Man Ray, finds her place in the sun" ELLE

Harper Bazaar’s publisher William Randolph Hearst, like many magazine proprietors, prohibited the use of black models in his publications. But somehow (possibly with the help of Bazaar’s editor Carmel Snow, who took issue with Hearst’s stance on race), a photograph of Adrienne by Man Ray featured in the September 1937 edition, making Ady Fidelin the first ever black woman to appear in a major fashion magazine. The two page spread was titled ‘The Bushongo of Africa Sends His Hats to Paris’. More on black models

Once in America, unbeknownst to Ady, Man Ray began a relationship with Juliet Browner whom he married in 1946, even as Ady struggled to save his works from German covetousness before returning them to her after Liberation. Although they maintained a correspondence at least until 1961, Man Ray barely speaks of her in his 1963 autobiography, following in this an earlier assessment where he had made his companion "a subordinate in the service of his brilliant partner " . However, in the 1970s he published a series of prints inspired by Ady 

Wendy A. Grossman and Sala E. Patterson believe that "Fidelin has been sidelined, victim of a conventional history that privileges racial or ethnic character over individuality, and the male artist over the female muse” . At the end of the 1950s, she married André Art, her companion for more than a decade. She spent the last moments of her life in Albi and died anonymously at the age of 88. More on Ady Fidelin

Lee Miller

Ady Fidelin, c. 1937

Hotel Vaste Horizon, Mougins, France

Fidelin’s relationship with Man Ray, first registered in entries in his date book in December of 1935, subsequently led to her introduction to Picasso and the circle of creatives who would become her virtual family for the next five years. 

Lee Miller

Man Ray and Ady Fidelin, c. 1937

Mougins, France

She appears in close to 400 photographs by Man Ray, as well as several paintings, drawings, prints and a short film by the American artist. She was also photographed by Wols (Alfred Otto Wolfgang Schulze) and was the subject of a recently identified painting by Picasso. More on Ady Fidelin

Ady Fidelin, Marie Cuttoli and her husband, Man Ray, Picasso and Dora Maar, 1937

Lee Miller

Picnic (Nusch Eluard, Paul Eluard, Roland Penrose, Man Ray, Ady Fidelin)

Gelatin silver print, 1937 (2012)

8 in. x 7 3/4 in. (203 mm x 197 mm)

National Portrait Gallery

Penrose met American-born photographer and photojournalist Lee Miller (1907-77) in Paris in 1937, and this photograph depicts them on holiday with friends at Mougins in the South of France. 

Man Ray

Lee Miller with Ady Fidelin, c. 1937

Île Sainte-Marguerite, Cannes

Elizabeth "Lee" Miller, Lady Penrose (April 23, 1907 – July 21, 1977), was an American photographer and photojournalist. She was a fashion model in New York City in the 1920s before going to Paris, where she became a fashion and fine art photographer. During the Second World War, she was a war correspondent for Vogue, covering events such as the London Blitz, the liberation of Paris, and the concentration camps at Buchenwald and Dachau.

In 1929, Miller intended to apprentice with the surrealist artist and photographer Man Ray. Although, at first, he insisted that he did not take students, Miller soon became his model and collaborator, as well as his lover and muse. More on Lee Miller

Pablo Picasso

Woman Seated on a Yellow and Pink Background II (Portrait of Ady Fidelin) September 8, 1937

Oil on canvas

81 x 60 cm.

Estate of Pablo Picasso

Man Ray

Adrienne Fidelin, Pablo Picasso, Dora Maar, 1937

Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. Among his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907), and the anti-war painting Guernica (1937), a dramatic portrayal of the bombing of Guernica by German and Italian air forces during the Spanish Civil War. More on Pablo Picasso

Currently part of the collection of the private Dapper Museum in Paris, the Bangwa Queen figure can be seen in this photograph in the company of a woman believed to be Man Ray's lover, model, and muse, Adrienne Fidelin

Man Ray (American, 1890–1976)

Ady Fidelin, ca. 1937

Gelatin silver print

5.8 x 8.8 cm. (2.3 x 3.5 in.)

Private collection

Man Ray

Ady Fidelin & Nusch Eluard

Nusch Éluard (born Maria Benz; 21 June 1906 – 28 November 1946) was a French performer, model and surrealist artist.

Nusch arrived in France as a stage performer, variously described as a small-time actress, a traveling acrobat, and a "hypnotist's stooge". She met Paul Éluard in 1930 working as a model, married him in 1934, produced surrealist photomontage and other work, and is the subject of "Facile," a collection of Éluard's poetry published as a photogravure book, illustrated with Man Ray's nude photographs of her.

She was also the subject of several cubist portraits and sketches by Pablo Picasso in the late 1930s, and is said to have had an affair with him. Nusch worked for the French Resistance during the Nazi occupation of France during World War II. She died in 1946 in Paris due to a stroke. More on Nusch Éluard

Man Ray (born Emmanuel Radnitzky; August 27, 1890 – November 18, 1976) was an American visual artist who spent most of his career in Paris. He was a significant contributor to the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal. He produced major works in a variety of media but considered himself a painter above all. He was best known for his pioneering photography, and was a renowned fashion and portrait photographer. He is also noted for his work with photograms, which he called "rayographs" in reference to himself. More on Man Ray

Please visit my other blogs: Art Collector, Mythology, Marine Art, Portrait of a Lady, The Orientalist, Art of the Nude and The Canals of Venice, Middle East Artists, 365 Saints and 365 Days, also visit my Boards on Pinterest

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04 Paintings, PORTRAIT OF A LADY, of the 18th & 19th C., with Footnotes. #20

John Wesley Jarvis, (American, 1780-1838)

Maria Holmes, American 1780-1834)

Oil on canvas

28 1/4" x 24 1/4"

Private collection

The subject is depicted in a black dress with lace shawl, her body angled slightly to her right, with part of a red painted chair visible behind her. 

Mary Jane Holmes (April 5, 1825 – October 6, 1907) was a bestselling and prolific American author who published 39 popular novels, as well as short stories. Her first novel sold 250,000 copies; and she had total sales of 2 million books in her lifetime, second only to Harriet Beecher Stowe.

Portraying domestic life in small-town and rural settings, she examined gender relationships, as well as those of class and race. She also dealt with slavery and the American Civil War with a strong sense of moral justice. Since the late 20th century she has received fresh recognition and reappraisal, although her popular work was excluded from most 19th-century literary histories. More on Mary Jane Holmes 

John Wesley Jarvis (1780 or 1781 – January 14, 1839) was an American painter, born at South Shields, England. His father was an American mariner, who moved his family to the United States in the mid-1780s. The Jarvis family settled in Philadelphia; there he spent his childhood and began his artistic training. His formal instruction began around 1796.

Jarvis moved to New York in 1801. Within a year he was working on his own as an engraver. In 1803 he entered into a partnership with Joseph Wood. His partnership with Wood lasted seven years. Together they executed engravings, miniatures, and larger portraits. He enjoyed great popularity, though his conviviality and eccentric mode of life affected his work. General Andrew Jackson was one of his sitters. 

While New York always remained his home base, he continued his habit of extended residences in other cities for most of the rest of his life. 

Jarvis rose to the top of his profession by 1814, when he took over an unprecedented commission for six full-length portraits of the naval heroes of the War of 1812 for the City of New York. For over a decade, he remained the premier portrait painter in New York./

As early as the 1820s, however, he received some personal setbacks. In 1823 he was sued successfully by his apprentice John Quidor for breach of contract, and the following year he lost custody of his children in a court battle with his estranged second wife. A decade later, in 1834, he suffered a debilitating stroke while in New Orleans. Partially paralyzed and mentally incapacitated, he spent the rest of his life in New York City, cared for by his sister. He died there in 1840, in poverty. More on John Wesley Jarvis 

JUSTUS SUSTERMANS, (ANTWERP 1597-1681 FLORENCE)

Portrait of Vittoria della Rovere, (1622-1694)

Oil on canvas 

66.8 x 52 cm.

Private collection

Vittoria della Rovere, Grand Duchess of Tuscany (1622-1694) was the wife of Ferdinando II de’ Medici. She was the daughter of Federigo-Ubaldo della Rovere (1604–1648) and Claudia de’ Medici.

She is best known as the last heir of the art collection assembled by her family in Urbino and as the person who, through marriage, passed them on to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany.  Always interested in worldly and cultural affairs, she spoke Spanish and French, knew Latin and sponsored a variety of literati, becoming patroness in 1654 of a literary academy in Siena called Le Assicurate, devoted exclusively to women. More on Vittoria della Rovere

Justus Sustermans (28 September 1597 – 23 April 1681) also known as Giusto Sustermans, was a Flemish painter working in the Baroque style. He was born in Antwerp and died in Florence.

Sustermans is chiefly notable for his portraits of members of the Medici family as he was their court painter. His work can be found in both the Palatina Gallery and the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, and in many other galleries around the globe. During his lifetime he was fêted as the finest portrait painter in Italy.

He first studied in Antwerp under Willem de Vos (a nephew of the painter Maerten de Vos), becoming his assistant in 1609. He then spent three and a half years in Paris, where he studied and collaborated with Frans Pourbus the younger. He was eventually invited to Florence under the patronage of the Medici family where he studied Italian portraitists such as Il Guercino, the Spanish Diego Velázquez and France’s Pierre Mignard. While in Italy he also became influenced by the Venetian artists. More on Justus Sustermans

Pablo Picasso, 1881–1973

Dora Maar assise

Ink, gouache and oil paint on paper on canvas

689 x 625 mm

Tate

Henriette Theodora Markovitch, pseudonym Dora Maar (November 22, 1907 in the 6th arrondissement of Paris – July 16, 1997 in Paris) was a painter who exhibited with the Surrealist group, before becoming a photographer and reporter. She was Picasso's mistress in the late 1930s and the war years, and one of his most important models during that period. A formidable personality, she was instrumental in encouraging Picasso's political awareness. He also admitted to being somewhat afraid of her. This work shows Dora as a smart, independent French woman, with her hands crossed elegantly in her lap. More on this painting

Pablo Ruiz y Picasso, also known as Pablo Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973), was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, stage designer, poet and playwright who spent most of his adult life in France. Regarded as one of the greatest and most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. One of his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907).

Picasso demonstrated extraordinary artistic talent in his early years, painting in a naturalistic manner through his childhood and adolescence. During the first decade of the 20th century, his style changed as he experimented with different theories, techniques, and ideas. His work is often categorized into periods. While the names of many of his later periods are debated, the most commonly accepted periods in his work are the Blue Period (1901–1904), the Rose Period (1904–1906), the African-influenced Period (1907–1909), Analytic Cubism (1909–1912), and Synthetic Cubism (1912–1919), also referred to as the Crystal period.

Exceptionally prolific throughout the course of his long life, Picasso achieved universal renown and immense fortune for his revolutionary artistic accomplishments, and became one of the best-known figures in 20th-century art. More on Pablo Picasso

Man Ray, 1890 - 1976

Portrait of Dora Maar, 1936

In 1935, Maar was commissioned to photograph the set of Jean Renoir's The Crime of Monsieur Lange. It was here that Maar was introduced to Picasso. Two years later, after the breakup of his relationship with Marie-Thérèse Walter with whom he had his daughter Maya, Maar photographed Picasso in his studio as he painted one of the greatest works of his life and indeed the 20th century, Guernica. More on Dora Mar 

Man Ray (born Emmanuel Radnitzky; August 27, 1890 – November 18, 1976) was an American visual artist who spent most of his career in France. He was a significant contributor to the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal. He produced major works in a variety of media but considered himself a painter above all. He was best known for his photography, and he was a renowned fashion and portrait photographer. Man Ray is also noted for his work with photograms, which he called "rayographs" in reference to himself. More on Man Ray

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10 Paintings, PORTRAIT OF A LADY, of the 18th & 19th C., with Footnotes. #10

Pablo Picasso, 1881 - 1973

Madame Canals, Benedetta Bianco. Paris, 1905

Oil and charcoal on canvas. 

90 x 70 cm

Museu Picasso, Barcelona

Once he had settled down definitively in Paris in 1904, Picasso got back in touch with several of his old friends from Barcelona. Without doubt, it was the ties to Ricard Canals which were strengthened the more in these new circumstances, and the portrait of Benedetta Bianco, the sentimental partner of Canals, testifies to that. At the Bateau Lavoir the two couples – Picasso and Fernande, and Canals and Benedetta – established a very close friendship: according to Fernande, Picasso would spend the days in the studio of Canals and Benedetta would make use of her culinary skills to feed everyone when the economic resources were scarce. More on Madame Canals

Pablo Ruiz y Picasso, also known as Pablo Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973), was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, stage designer, poet and playwright who spent most of his adult life in France. Regarded as one of the greatest and most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. One of his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907).

Picasso demonstrated extraordinary artistic talent in his early years, painting in a naturalistic manner through his childhood and adolescence. During the first decade of the 20th century, his style changed as he experimented with different theories, techniques, and ideas. His work is often categorized into periods. While the names of many of his later periods are debated, the most commonly accepted periods in his work are the Blue Period (1901–1904), the Rose Period (1904–1906), the African-influenced Period (1907–1909), Analytic Cubism (1909–1912), and Synthetic Cubism (1912–1919), also referred to as the Crystal period.

Exceptionally prolific throughout the course of his long life, Picasso achieved universal renown and immense fortune for his revolutionary artistic accomplishments, and became one of the best-known figures in 20th-century art. More on Pablo Picasso

Ricardo Canals y Llambi

A Balcony At The Bullfight, 1904

Oil on canvas

157.00 x 256.30 cm

Private collection

Painted in 1904 while Canals was living and working in a studio at the Bateau Lavoir in Montmartre, this animated painting shows a wonderfully elegant array of ladies dressed up for the great social occasion of the bullfight, in manola dress with their black and white mantillas. As part of a typical artistic device, used by Renoir, Manet, and Goya before them, the spectators become the spectacle, The bull ring offered a wonderful opportunity for the audience - especially the ladies - to show off their finery, and became almost as much an occasion for observing one another as it was to follow the performance. More on Balcony At The Bullfight

The two central ladies leaning on the balustrade were Fernande Olivier and Benedetta ('Bianco') Coletti. Fernande was muse and model to the Catalan painter Joaquín Sunyer, but she famously left him for Picasso when the latter arrived at the Bateau Lavoir in 1904. The Italian-born Benedetta became Canal's lover and later his wife. At the beginning of her relationship with Picasso, Fernande was living with Canals and Bianco, and the pose of the central figures in the present work is clearly borrowed directly from a 1904 photograph of the two in Canals’ studio. More on this painting

Ricard Canals i Llambí (13 December 1876, Barcelona - 7 February 1931, Barcelona) was a Catalan Impressionist painter, illustrator and engraver; initially associated with the short-lived "Saffron Group".

He began his studies in 1893 at the Escola de la Llotja, but stayed only a short time before leaving to travel with friends. He ended up in Paris with Nonell, where he held a successful showing at "Le Barc de Boutteville", a gallery devoted to young artists. This enabled him to obtain Paul Durand-Ruel as an agent and exhibit throughout Europe and the United States.

Although many of his Parisian paintings were in Spanish costumbrista style, to appeal to his French clients, during this time he came under the influence of Renoir and Degas. He also continued a friendship with Picasso, whom he had met in Barcelona. In 1905, Picasso painted a portrait of the model, Benedetta Bianco (above), who would later become Canals' wife. The year before, Canals had painted "A Box at the Bullfight", which portrayed Bianco and Picasso's future partner, Fernande Olivier (this painting).

He returned to Barcelona in 1907. Three years later, he was named Chairman of the painting section of the newly founded association, "Les Arts i els Artistes". He remained a member until his death. The organization disbanded in 1936. During this time, he made long stays in Madrid, Seville and Granada, painting a wide variety of subjects, although he is especially remembered for his portraits. More on Canals

Venetian School, 18th/19th century

 Ladies

Oil on panel

6-1/2''h, 5''w

Private collection

Venetian school (art). From the later part of the 15th century, Venice had a distinctive, thriving and influential art scene. Beginning with the work of Giorgione (c. 1477–1510), and the workshop of Giovanni Bellini (c. 1430–1516), major artists of the Venetian school included Titian (1489–1576), Tintoretto (1518–1594), Veronese (1528–1588) and the Bassano (1510–1592). Considered to bring a primacy of color over line, this tradition was seen to contrast with the Mannerism then prevalent in the rest of Italy, and the Venetian style is viewed as having had a great influence on the subsequent development of painting. More on Venetian school

Ignacio Zuloaga, 1870 - 1945, SPANISH

LA OTERITO (Eulalia Franco), c. 1936

Oil on canvas

176 by 120.5cm., 69¼ by 47½in.

Private collection

Zuloaga's depiction of the dancer Eulalia Franco - familiarly called La Bella Oterito - sitting in her dressing room is one of the most sexually suggestive portraits that he ever painted.

But for wearing a bullfighter's short cropped chaquetilla, a bouquet of flowers in her hair, and a pair of red satin high-healed shoes on her feet, Eulalia sits proudly naked at her dressing table as she turns to look teasingly at the viewer. Her supremely elegant and confident pose - the product of a colourful career on stage - belies any notion of her own sense of déshabillé. The velvet curtain pulled back to the left of the composition simultaneously alludes to the artist's debt to the Spanish Baroque, indicates Eulalia’s profession, and - peep-show-like in intent - allows the viewer the opportunity to glory in her titillating state of undress.

Eulalia Franco's diminutive appellation ‘La Oterito’ is derived from comparisons made of her to another leading dancer of the day Carolina 'la belle' Otero (1868-1965), who made her stage reputation in Paris in the role of an Andalusian gypsy and as a star at Les Folies Bergère. Eulalia likewise specialised in performing Spanish dances and songs, and in her free interpretation and exuberant delivery she not only made the most of her curvaceous form, but was widely viewed as technically more accomplished than her namesake. Although she attracted considerable attention within Spain, her reputation was made in performances abroad, where she garnered a huge following as the star attraction in shows across Europe, the USA and South America. More on Eulalia Franco

Ignacio Zuloaga, in full Ignacio Zuloaga y Zabaleta (born July 26, 1870, Eibar, near Bilbao, Spain—died Oct. 31, 1945, Madrid) Spanish genre and portrait painter noted for his theatrical paintings of figures from Spanish culture and folklore.

The son of a successful metalworker, Zuloaga was a largely self-taught artist who learned to paint by copying Old Masters in the Prado Museum in Madrid. Beginning about 1890, he split his time between Paris and Spain. In Paris he became acquainted with the artists Paul Gauguin, Edgar Degas, and Auguste Rodin. Despite his contact with these prominent French artists, however, his main influences were the Spanish masters El Greco, Diego Velázquez, and Francisco de Goya.

Inspired by a visit to the Andalusia region of Spain in 1892, Zuloaga began to focus on subject matter from Spanish culture and folklore, such as bullfighters, peasants, and dancers. He used earthen colours almost exclusively and often placed his figures against dramatic landscapes. Zuloaga began to achieve international success with the painting Daniel Zuloaga and His Daughters, which was exhibited in 1899 and purchased by the French government for the Luxembourg Museum in Paris. About 1907 he became a popular society portraitist, an aspect of his career that brought him considerable wealth.

After spending much of his career working in Paris, Zuloaga settled permanently in Spain in 1924. His paintings were exhibited in a highly successful one-man show in New York City in 1925. He was awarded the grand prize for painting at the Venice Biennale in 1938. More on Ignacio Zuloaga

British School, 19th century

Portrait of a lady

Oil on canvas

30-1/4''h, 25-1/4''w.

Private collection

In the 18th century, English painting finally developed a distinct style and tradition again. Sir James Thornhill's paintings were executed in the Baroque style of the European Continent and William Hogarth reflected the new English middle-class temperament — English in habits, disposition, and temperament, as well as by birth. His satirical works, full of black humour, point out to contemporary society the deformities, weaknesses and vices of London life.

Portraits were, as elsewhere in Europe, most easy and most profitable way for an artist to make a living, and the English tradition continued to draw of the relaxed elegance of the portrait style developed in England by Van Dyck. By the end of the century, the English swagger portrait was much admired abroad, and had largely ceased to look for inspiration abroad.

The early 19th century also saw the emergence of the Norwich school of painters. Influenced by Dutch landscape painting and the landscape of Norfolk. It was short-lived due to sparse patronage and internal faction prominent members.

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood movement, established in the 1840s, dominated English art in the second half of the 19th century. Its members concentrated on religious, literary, and genre works executed in a colorful and minutely detailed almost photographic style. More on British School, 18th & 19th century

Auguste Toulmouche, (French 1829-1890)

"Le Billet"   1883 

Oil on Canvas Size

66 x 45 cm

Museum of Fine Arts, Nantes, France

Auguste Toulmouche (September 21, 1829 – October 16, 1890) was a French painter who painted in the academic realism style.  He studied design with a local sculptor and painting with a local portraitist.  In 1846, he moved to Paris.  There he entered the studio of Swiss artist Charles Gleyre and, by 1848, was ready to make his Salon debut.  He was only nineteen years old. He won a third class medal in 1852 and a second class medal in 1861.  In 1870, he was awarded the Legion of Honour.

Toulmouche is best known for his depictions of richly clad women set against the backdrop of luxurious interiors.  His paintings have been called “elegant trifles” and the ladies who feature in them have been referred to as “Toulmouche’s delicious dolls.”  One critic even compared the interiors of a Toulmouche painting to daintily decorated jewel boxes.  

In 1862, Toulmouche married a cousin of Claude Monet.  This alliance led to his being asked to mentor the young Monet.

Auguste Toulmouche died in Paris on October 16, 1890.  Those paintings of his that are not now in private collections can be found hanging in some of the finest museums in the world. More Auguste Toulmouche

Julius LeBlanc Stewart, 1855 - 1919

Portrait of Marie Renard 

Oil on panel 

9 1/2 by 6 inches (24.1 by 15.2 cm)

Private collection

Marie Renard (8 January 1864 – 19 October 1939) was an Austrian operatic mezzo-soprano, later soprano. Born Marie Pölzl, she first studied voice in her native city of Graz and later in Berlin. She debuted in 1882 in Graz as Azucena in Verdi's Il trovatore, filling in for another singer, and was engaged there until 1884. The following season (1884–1885) she sang at the German Theatre in Prague. After making guest appearances in the title roles at the Berlin Hofoper in 1885, she became a member of that company from 1885 to 1888 and sang there in the premiere of Heinrich Hofmann's Donna Diana on 15 November 1886.

In 1888 she was engaged by the Vienna Hofoper. She reached the peak of her career and popularity with that company. She was prized above all for her portrayals of roles in French operas (sung in German), in particular as Carmen. One of her most memorable performances was as Charlotte in the world premiere of Massenet's Werther.

After her retirement she married Count Rudolf Kinsky. She died in her native city of Graz. More on Marie Renard

Julius LeBlanc Stewart (September 6, 1855, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania — January 5, 1919, Paris, France), was an American artist who spent his career in Paris. A contemporary of fellow expatriate painter John Singer Sargent.

His father, the sugar millionaire William Hood Stewart, moved the family from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Paris in 1865, and became a distinguished art collector. Julius studied under Eduardo Zamacois andJean-Léon Gérôme at the École des Beaux-Arts, and later was a pupil of Raymondo de Madrazo.

Stewart's family wealth enabled him to live a lush expatriate life and paint what he pleased, often large-scaled group portraits. He exhibited regularly at the Paris Salon from 1878 into the early 20th century, and helped organize the "Americans in Paris" section of the 1894 Salon. The Baptism, which reportedly depicts a gathering of the Vanderbilt family, was shown at the 1893 Chicago World's Columbian Exposition, and received acclaim at the 1895 Berlin International Exposition (below).

Julius LeBlanc Stewart  (1855–1919)

The Baptism, c. 1892

Oil on canvas

201.3 × 297.5 cm (79.3 × 117.1 in)

Los Angeles County Museum of Art

He painted a series of sailing pictures. The most accomplished of these, Venice, showed a sailing party on deck and included a portrait of the actress Lillie Langtry. Another, Yachting on the Mediterranean, set a record price for the artist, selling in 2005 for US$2.3 million.[2]

Late in life, he turned to religious subjects, but Stewart is best remembered for his Belle Époque society portraits and sensuous nudes. More on Julius LeBlanc Stewart

Natalia Baykalova, April 7, 1985 Krasnoyarsk, Russia

Hakama №1

Oil on canvas

36.2 H x 49.2 W x 1.2 in

Private collection

Hakama are a type of traditional Japanese clothing. Trousers were used by the Chinese imperial court in the Sui and Tang dynasties, and this style was adopted by the Japanese in the form of hakama beginning in the sixth century. Hakama are tied at the waist and fall approximately to the ankles. They are worn over a kimono (hakamashita). More on Hakama

Natalia Baykalova, April 7, 1985 Krasnoyarsk, Russia

Hakama №2

Oil on canvas

50 x 70 x 2 cm

Private collection

Natalia Baykalova was born on April, 7th, 1985 in Krasnoyarsk, Russia. Her mother Tatiana noticed her artistic talent and encouraged her to persue her ambition. At the age of 10 years Natalia started to attending classes in an art studio, then progressed to he most higher art school of Surikova. At the age of 15 Natalia joined the Art College of Surikova, well known for their classical traditions. 

Natalia begins her career working as a designer, illustrator, and then as an Art Director in City Format Magazine. At the magazine she has begun to work as a photographer. This new work helped Natalia to define further visions and directions for her paintings. During those same years she created her own style of painting. Painting has become her first priority. All her life experiences and education are mixed together to deliver a very talented and experienced paintings to the world. "In paintings I reflect my knowledge, emotions, myself and the world". More on Natalia Baykalova

Acknowledgement: Sotheby's, and others

Images are copyright of their respective owners, assignees or others

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