Rosa Bonheur, Art as a Career

"A White Horse" by Rosa Bonheur

"When Rosa's mother died Rosa was immediately sent to one of her aunts who placed her in a pension [boarding house] near the Champs Elysees, but the child could not brook the restricted life, and in a very short time returned to her father. It became clear to him that Rosa ought to be trained to earn her living, and so he apprenticed her to a dressmaker. But the result was no more fortunate than the pension, and at the end of twelve days the apprenticeship ended. Some friends who made heraldic paintings, kindly took Rosa in, and as her natural taste for working with colours at once showed itself, she was set to daub easy designs, even receiving a small money reward for her work. But her father did not wish to impose on them for too long a time and brought her back home.

One of the rooms of the Bonheurs' apartment had been transformed into a studio, and here the girl worked hard all day, drawing and painting with the hope of showing her father that her true vocation was art. One evening when he returned from his day of lesson-giving he found a picture of a bunch of cherries on the easel, the first picture that Rosa had painted from nature. 'It is very pretty,' he said to her, 'but now you must study seriously because you will become an artist. Her career may be said to have commenced from this moment.

Rosa was set to draw, and to draw continuously, either from still life in the studio, or some statue or picture at the Louvre, her father setting her a daily task. But she found that she was not sufficiently advanced to copy old masters, and threw herself into the work of the studio with the ardour and perseverance which were characteristic of her temperament. In later life she advised all beginners to steep themselves in the work of the old masters, adding that such is the true grammar of art."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "Rosa Bonheur" by Frank Hird.)