Cornelia Scheffer

Cornelia Scheffer (née Lamme; 23 April 1769 – 4 July 1839) was a Dutch painter and portrait miniaturist. She was known as "a woman of much energy and strength of character." She also "was distinguished by her talents, her wit, and many good qualities, which rendered her one of the remarkable women of her time." She is often thought of as the most visually commemorated artist’s mother of all time.

Biography Early life

Born Cornelia Lamme, in Dordrecht, she was the daughter of Johanna van Es and the landscape painter Arie Lamme (1748–1801), by whom she was probably trained. She grew up with a younger brother, Arnoldus (1771–1856) in the artistic society of Dordrecht. As child she learnt French, German and English, played music and was well read. The family moved to Den Haag in 1798, then Rotterdam in 1801, and finally Amsterdam in 1803. When she found herself unable to find work through King Louis I, she decided to move to Paris with Ary in 1811. One year later she asked her other two sons to join her there. She is not known to have made any original pieces after 1811. It is speculated that Ary and Hendrik were trained as painters at the studio of Prud’hon before studying under Pierre-Narcisse Guérin. Ary’s work became very popular, partly due to the recognition he received from the French royal family, and became a well known portrait artist. In 1821, Cornelia began to work for him and Henri as a copyist, likely to keep a personal collection of his work. In this period she also began modelling for her sons. In 1830, following an increase in demand for Ary’s work, he decided to move to a villa on Rue Chaptal in Nouvelle Athène, which was an arts district near Montmartre. Cornelia decided to move in with him soon after. In 1845, she modelled for her son Ary's painting Saints Augustine and Monica. (However, the version on display at the National Gallery in London was done in 1854 with a different model, Mrs. Robert Holland.)

Late life and death

Throughout her later life with Ary, her other two sons lived either with them or nearby. Her nieces and nephews, including art dealer and first director of the Boijmans museum, Arie Johannes Lamme, often came to visit. She was unaware of her namesake granddaughter, Ary’s daughter (unknown mother), until she came to live with them in the villa in 1837. She died in Paris in 1839, aged 70. She was buried in a plot at the Montmartre Cemetery, together with a life-sized cast of her on her deathbed, made by Ary. Her sons grieved the loss of their mother greatly, with Ary creating 20 ‘post mortem’ pieces for her, including one of her on her deathbed and a marble gravestone. They were both kept in his atelier along with a cast of her hands for his entire life.

Works

Most of Cornelia’s work consists of portraits of family and the elite by which she was contracted. She adopted multiple artistic media including watercolour, chalk and oil paints. According to various biographies, she was said to have made numerous etchings as well, however, none survive to this day. In addition to the miniatures for which she is well known, she also made larger portraits and copies of older masters up to one meter in height.

In 1810, there was an exhibition in Amsterdam called Exposition of Living Masters in which some of her works were displayed, including two of her miniature portraits. She currently has 70 pieces of her work displayed in public collections in the Dordrecht Museum, Amsterdam Museum, Museum Boijmand van Beuningen in Rotterdam and the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.