Starred review from January 1, 2021
Rosa Bonheur called art a tyrant, but art was also a liberator for this gender rebel who became the most famous and wealthiest woman artist in nineteenth-century France. Bonheur was celebrated for her powerful, anatomically precise portraits of animals, a focus which stemmed from her ardor for nature as a rebellious tomboy whose artistic gifts surpassed those of her art instructor father. In Hewitt's third commanding biography of an overlooked French woman, following Renoir's Dancer: The Secret Life of Suzanne Valadon (2018), she nearly purrs as she recounts with enriching detail and narrative drive Bonheur's absolute dedication to her work and her independence, vividly establishing the tumultuous social and political contexts in which Bonheur overcame entrenched misogyny and negative views of lesbianism. Hewitt chronicles Bonheur's support of her extended family, the two great loves of her life, her journeys to observe animals in their natural habitats, and the rambunctious menagerie of wild creatures she harbored at her Fontainebleau chateau. Forthright, incisive, adored by aristocrats, generous, and funny, Bonheur astounded and thrilled critics and the public alike with her soulful paintings of oxen, horses, dogs, sheep, lions, and tigers right up to her death in 1899, only for her fame to evaporate in the new century. Hewitt's rousing biography will propel a resurgence of appreciation for Bonheur and her achievements.
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