Eva Gonzalès

Eva Gonzalès (19 April 1847 – 6 May 1883) was a French Impressionist painter. She was one of the four most notable female Impressionists in the nineteenth century, along with Mary Cassatt (1844–1926), Berthe Morisot (1841–95), and Marie Bracquemond (1840–1916).

Early life Gonzalès was born in Paris and became introduced to sophisticated literary and art circles at an early age by her father, writer Emmanuel Gonzalès. In 1865, at age sixteen, Eva Gonzalès began her professional training and art lessons in drawing from the society portraitist Charles Chaplin.

Through her father's connections as a founding president of the Société des gens de lettres, she met a variety of members of the Parisian cultural elite, and from a young age was exposed to the new ideas surrounding art and literature at the time. Three years later she met Manet and soon became his model and then his student.

Student of Édouard Manet Gonzalès is best known for her starting out as a pupil of the artist Édouard Manet in February 1869. This relationship was formed by poor reviews that Manet received about his Salon entries, which made him hesitant to openly discuss his work; however, something about Eva's presence brought Manet out of his shell.

In Portrait of Eva Gonzalès, Manet depicts her working at an easel, yet her stiff posture and expensive dress are clearly unfit for creating artwork. This depiction of her likely caused some critics to perceive her simply as a young, decorative model who was working with an older established male painter. Gonzalès was Manet's only formal student and also modeled for several members of the Impressionist school.

Career and later life Gonzalès' work was celebrated by Salon reviewers for the inherent intuition with which she approached art, as well as her technical skill.

Like Manet, Gonzalès did not exhibit in the Impressionist exhibitions but is considered part of the group because of her painting style. While studying under Manet, Gonzalès' self-portraits suggest that she was exploring her individuality and identity as an artist by presenting subtle correctives to Manet's version of her. Until 1872, she was strongly influenced by Manet but later developed her own, more personal style. This can be seen in works such as Enfant de Troupe (1870), which is a nod to Manet's Le Fifre (1866), while many of her later paintings involved portraits of her sister, Jeanne. It was common of Eva Gonzalès to use her family members, particularly her husband and her sister, Jeanne Gonzalès, as models in her work.

Death In 1883, Gonzalès died in childbirth at the age of thirty-six, which left her son to be raised by his father and her sister, Jeanne, who later became Guerard's second wife. Since her death, exhibitions of Gonzales work were held at the Salons de La Vie Moderne (1885), the Salon d'Automne (1907), at several galleries in Paris. Eva Gonzalès paintings, Bio, ideas. The Art Story. (n.d.). Retrieved October 14, 2022, from https://www.theartstory.org/artist/gonzales-eva/