GENERAL DESCRIPTION
Anne Vallayer-Coster was born into an upper class, artistic family in Paris in 1744. Her mother was a painter and her father was a goldsmith. Vallayer-Coster likely received her early artistic instruction studying drawing with Madeleine Basseporte, a family friend and godmother to her sister Madeleine, and painting with the celebrated landscapist Joseph Vernet. One of the rare women to be elected a member of the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in the 18th century, she was received in 1770 as a painter of still lifes whose works were compared to those of Jean-Siméon Chardin. Notably, she was the only woman in these years to be accepted without having royal support or a spouse or father in the Academy. Although Vallayer-Coster was best known as a gifted and popular flower painter, she also produced miniatures and life-sized oil portraits, gaining the patronage of nobles as well as the French monarchy. She made several portraits of the royal family including Queen Marie Antoinette, who secured Vallayer-Coster housing in the Louvre by 1781. Quickly overshadowed by the portrait painters Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun and Adélaïde Labille-Guiard, also made Academicians in 1783 and to whom she was unfavorably compared, Vallayer-Coster returned to her specialty and focused solely on still-life painting from 1785 forward. Despite her relation to the monarchs and disapproval from the public, Vallayer-Coster stayed in Paris during the French Revolution where she secretly held official documents for the queen. Her career essentially vanished with the outbreak of the Revolution and subsequent establishment of the First French Empire, but she did not cease painting. She returned to public life following the Bourbon Restoration with a gift supporting King Louis XVIII and participated in the Salon of 1817 for the last time. She died in Paris the following year at the age of 73.
Excerpt from
Kelsey Martin and Nicole Myers, DMA exhibition text Women Artists in Europe from the Monarchy to Modernism, 2018.
NOTES
1998.51.FA, 1998.52.FA
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WEB RESOURCES
- DMA Uncrated~Check out the blogs from the Dallas Museum of Art that include works by Vallayer-Coster.
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General Description
Anne Vallayer-Coster was born into an upper class, artistic family in Paris in 1744. Her mother was a painter and her father was a goldsmith. Vallayer-Coster likely received her early artistic instruction studying drawing with Madeleine Basseporte, a family friend and godmother to her sister Madeleine, and painting with the celebrated landscapist Joseph Vernet. One of the rare women to be elected a member of the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in the 18th century, she was received in 1770 as a painter of still lifes whose works were compared to those of Jean-Siméon Chardin. Notably, she was the only woman in these years to be accepted without having royal support or a spouse or father in the Academy. Although Vallayer-Coster was best known as a gifted and popular flower painter, she also produced miniatures and life-sized oil portraits, gaining the patronage of nobles as well as the French monarchy. She made several portraits of the royal family including Queen Marie Antoinette, who secured Vallayer-Coster housing in the Louvre by 1781. Quickly overshadowed by the portrait painters Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun and Adélaïde Labille-Guiard, also made Academicians in 1783 and to whom she was unfavorably compared, Vallayer-Coster returned to her specialty and focused solely on still-life painting from 1785 forward. Despite her relation to the monarchs and disapproval from the public, Vallayer-Coster stayed in Paris during the French Revolution where she secretly held official documents for the queen. Her career essentially vanished with the outbreak of the Revolution and subsequent establishment of the First French Empire, but she did not cease painting. She returned to public life following the Bourbon Restoration with a gift supporting King Louis XVIII and participated in the Salon of 1817 for the last time. She died in Paris the following year at the age of 73.
Excerpt from
Kelsey Martin and Nicole Myers, DMA exhibition text Women Artists in Europe from the Monarchy to Modernism, 2018.
Fun Facts
Archival Resources
Web Resources
- DMA Uncrated~Check out the blogs from the Dallas Museum of Art that include works by Vallayer-Coster.
Notes
1998.51.FA, 1998.52.FA
source file
artists_and_designers-0005.xml.nores