Louise Ward: Difference between revisions

French painter (1849–1930)

Louise Ward
Born	(1849-07-09)9 July 1849
Died	11 February 1930(1930-02-11) (aged 80) Paris, France
Other names	Louise Dubréau Louise Dubreau Louise de Ward Marquise d’Hervey de Saint-Denys Marquise d’Hervey de Saint-Denis Louise de Waru Madame de Waru
Occupation	Painter
Years active	1875–1899[1]

Louise Ward, sometimes rendered Louise de Ward^[2] (9 July 1849 – 11 February 1930),^[3] known in the art world by her pseudonym Louise Dubréau or Louise Dubreau, was a French painter and Parisian society belle.

Ward was born on 9 July 1849^[3] in Parma, Italy,^[3][a] where her father had been stationed as chief minister of the Duke of Parma.^[5] Burke’s Peerage of 1850 and thereafter indicates that her birth name was Elizabeth Margaret Ward.^[6][7][b]

She was an Austrian baroness who was the daughter of Baron Thomas Ward^[3][10] and his wife Louise Genthner, a Viennese commoner whom Thomas Ward had married in 1832.^[11]

She was educated in a convent school in France.^[2][12]

After her marriage to a French marquis in 1868,^[3] Ward became an accomplished and successful painter in Paris, studying with Pierre Auguste Cot.^[2] She signed her paintings “Louise Dubréau”,^[2] sometimes rendered “Louise Dubreau”^[3][13][14] or “Louise du Bréau”,^[15] after her husband d’Hervey’s estate Château du Bréau near Dourdan^[2] in Seine-et-Oise^[16][17] in the department of Yvelines.^[16]

Two of her best-known paintings are The Old Lodger (1877), which was exhibited at the Salon de 1877^[4] and auctioned at Christie’s in 2008;^[18] and Printemps (1882), which was exhibited at the Salon de 1882.^[19]

Her portrait of Count Friedrich Ferdinand von Beust was widely praised and was exhibited at the Salon de 1883.^[20][14]

In 1868, at the age of 18, she married French sinologist Marie-Jean-Léon, Marquis d’Hervey de Saint Denys.^[3] Her title became Marquise d’Hervey de Saint-Denys, sometimes rendered Marquise d’Hervey de Saint-Denis.^[2] The couple lived in Paris in their mansion at 9 Avenue Bosquet.^[21][2][22]

In Paris, Ward became a society belle (mondaine)^[2][23] and a grande dame,^[2] and was known as a great beauty.^{[23][13][15][2]} Marcel Proust based at least one princess on her in his multi-volume novel series In Search of Lost Time.^[24][25][16]

Ward’s great benefactor in France was the Duchesse de Luynes^[26][2] (1849–1905), also known as Yolande de La Rochefoucauld^[27] or Yolande Dalbert.^[2] The duchess was also a painter and a fellow student at the studio of Pierre Auguste Cot, where they met.^[2] The two became lifelong friends and companions.^[26][28][12]

Her first husband, Hervey de Saint Denys, died in 1892.^[29][30][31]

In 1896, Ward remarried, to French aristocrat and Olympic equestrian Jacques de Waru (1865–1911).^[3] He was described by contemporaries as “a very militant young royalist”;^[32] his family had been close to the French monarchy since its restoration in 1804, and his grandfather, Adolphe, had made a personal fortune in banking and served as a regent of the Banque de France from 1856 to 1871.^[33]

Ward died in Paris in February 1930,^[34] at the age of 80.^[3]

She is buried in a large decorative tomb in the small cemetery of the Romanesque church Saint-Ferréol in Saint-Forget in the department of Yvelines.^[28][12]

• Ne dine jamais en ville [Never dine out] (known in English as The Old Lodger) (1877)^[2]
• Chanteuse des rues [Street Singer] (1878)^[4][2][15]
• Jeanne d’Arc (1879)^[2][35]
• Marchand de marrons [Chestnut Seller] (1880)^[36]
• Printemps (1882)^[19]