Berthe Morisot is one of the founding members of Impressionism, exhibiting in all but one of the famous eight Impressionist exhibitions. Despite her paintings being frequently described as ‘delicate’, ‘charming’ or ‘gracious’ by contemporary critics – words alluding to her female identity – her characteristic technique of painterly brushstrokes and pastel colours was critically acclaimed by the French press during her lifetime.
Morisot was born on 14 January 1841 in Bourges, the youngest of three sisters, with oldest sister Yves (1838–1893) and middle sister Edma (1839–1921). She grew up in Passy, near the famous Bois de Boulogne park on the outskirts of Paris. The three sisters received their initial artistic training from Geoffroy-Alphonse Chocarne (1797–1870) in 1857. However, the artist failed to keep them interested; Yves gave up painting altogether and Berthe and Edma moved to study under the renowned Joseph Guichard (1806–1880) soon after. It was Guichard who recognised the two Morisot sisters' talent and who took them to the Louvre to copy famous paintings.
In 1861 they were introduced to Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, the most celebrated landscape artist of the day. Influencing much of Berthe’s future work, Corot’s realism inspired the sisters to paint outdoors (known as en plein air). Both Berthe and Edma exhibited their landscape and figure paintings at the Paris Salon from 1864 where critics would often notice the similarities between their and Corot’s landscapes – much to the annoyance of Berthe. Like her elder sister Yves, Edma stopped painting after her marriage in 1869 but continued to support Berthe by posing frequently for her figure paintings.
While copying paintings at the Louvre in 1868, Morisot met Edouard Manet and Claude Monet whom she would work closely over the years. She formed an especially close friendship with Manet, for whom she posed on several occasions and whom she cited as an important influence in her early work. She greatly admired Manet’s radical figure paintings and in turn, the artist praised her technique of rapid brushstrokes, taking inspiration from her subjects and compositions later in his career. Morisot married Manet’s brother Eugène in 1874 and the two artists remained close friends until Edouard’s untimely death in 1883.
Through Monet’s efforts Morisot joined the newly founded Société des Artistes Anonyme in 1873, staging – along with Edgar Degas, Paul Cezanne, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Camille Pissarro, Alfred Sisley and others – the first official Impressionist Exhibition the following year. Morisot contributed four oil paintings, three watercolours and two pastels, receiving relatively positive reviews compared to her male colleagues. Despite this fairly favourable reception, most critics commented predominantly on the fact that she was the only woman in the group. Ultimately, the only Impressionist exhibition Morisot did not participate in was held in April and May 1879, as she gave birth to her daughter Julie Manet shortly before in December 1878. She was the driving force behind the group’s last exhibition in 1886, affirming her position as one of the leading Impressionists.
Throughout her career, Morisot painted mainly women and children in indoor settings, in gardens or in the park of the Bois de Boulogne close to her home. As shown by the large number of portraits of her sisters and nieces, being a woman limited her to painting private, familiar spaces. Her oeuvre is characterised by the use of pastel colours, with soft pinks, greys and light blues predominating. These tonalities were also used by artists of the Rococo, such as Jean-Antoine Watteau, Jean-Honoré Fragonard and François Boucher, whom she much admired. However, her technique of rapid brushstrokes and her paintings of domestic settings were different to the classically academic Rococo with its highly romanticised imagery.
After her death in 1895, like so many women artists, Morisot’s legacy was largely forgotten. Nevertheless, as a result of the rise of interest in women artists, Morisot has returned to where she began – at the forefront of Impressionism.
