Cover Image: Renoir's Dancer

Renoir's Dancer

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Not going to lie, I wanted a bit more gossip (lol)! BUT, I did enjoy this book. Took me a little longer to finish it as there was a lot (albeit interesting) of information to consume. Honestly, didn't know what to expect but learning about Suzanne Valadon's life and work was really refreshing!

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Thank you for the opportunity to read and review this title. Unfortunately, I was not able to finish this book which means I will not be able to review it. I truly appreciate the opportunity and apologize for the inconvenience the lack of review may cause you.

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Suzanne Valadon, the name by which she is best known, spent almost all of her long-life in Montmartre. The illegitimate daughter of a French peasant women, she moved with her mother and half-sister to Paris as a child and was raised on the streets. Discovering drawing changed her life.

She became an important model for many of the Impressionists and was a part of their circle. Still drawing though, she was introduced to Degas who became her teacher.

Her life was tumultuous and bohemian in the extreme. She had an illegitimate son, who became a painter as well. As time went on she became well regarded and widely exhibited.

This biography is detailed and rich while still being very readable.. I really loved that Hewitt took the time to give us background on so many things that had an impact on the story from the history of the Montmartre cafes to the background of the many artistic societies in Paris.

It's a wonderful biography of someone who should be better known,

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This is a super fascinating biography regarding the subjest of one of my favorite paintings. Highly recommend if you are interested in art/history.

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Suzanne was once called 'the terror of Montmartre'. The pretty golden-haired child of a single mother climbed out of Windows, played truant from school and associated with vagabonds. After joining the circus, however, she suffered a terrible accident and focused on her drawing. Once she became an artist's model for illustrious artists, such as Renoir, she was on the road to success.

She became respectable married woman, the mistress of a large house with her own studio and servants. But she had trouble with her son's inclination to drink. Would she give it all up for a handsome and much younger man...?

This is a fascinating tale about the wild-child of Montmartre and her talented son with vivid
descriptions of the bohemian lives of the famous artists of the late 19th century. I felt that I had a birds-eye view to the charm and glamour of the Paris of the time. Suzanne Valadon has been neglected so this biography is a welcome addition to books about these artists.

I received this free ebook from Net Galleyin return for an honest review.

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**I received an ebook copy via NetGalley in return for an honest review.**

I really enjoyed this book because it gave so much insight into the art world in France during the 20th century. While the story focuses on Suzanne Valadon and her modeling and painting career, Cathrine Hewitt gives us glimpses into famous painters in the era like Renoir, Vincent van Gogh, and Picasso. Hewitt does such a great job of bringing the setting of Montmartre to life along with its artists in a way that makes this book feel less like a biography and more like a historical fiction novel. But the story follows the history of that time to a tee.

As I was reading this book, I wanted to know more about the artists Suzanne encounters and befriends throughout her life, and the biography really made me interested in learning more about France during this time period. It also made me appreciate what I already knew about impressionist artwork.

My only issue is that I felt like the last quarter of the book lacked the passion and the spark that brought the characters to life in the first 3/4 of the book. The last years of Suzanne's life felt rushed and not as detailed. It felt like Hewitt was just telling us the timeline of Suzanne's life and paintings without the real creativity and storytelling that immersed me in early parts of the book.

I will definitely be purchasing a hard copy of this book and reading her first book The Mistress of Paris!

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nyone who has seen Renoir's paintings of dancers may not be able to resist this biography of one of these graceful women, Suzanne Valadon. A friend to many of the Impressionist painters, this strong woman was a painter in her own right and an interesting character in Impressionist art history.

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What a wonderful book about someone that knows anything about. My parents, when I was young, got me interested in the Impressionist period of painting. This story brings this period of time to life and gives us an inside look at one woman who changed the way you look at painting.

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Thanks St. Martin's Press and netgalley for this ARC.

This bio takes you back in time in that titillating, thilling, and magical way only a special author has the power to bestow.

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Catherine Hewitt's Renoir's Dancer expertly examines the life and influence of Marie-Clémentine Valadon, later known as Suzanne Valadon. I admit that the narrative is slow sometimes, but this did not really deter my interest in the book. Before reading Hewitt's work, I no idea of the full life that Valadon lived mixing and mingling with some of the greatest artists of her time, first as a model, and later as an accepted artist in her own right. Hewitt narrative brings to life Valadon in ways I could not have expected when I first requested this work, and I would recommend it to anyone interested in the time period, art, Paris, and/or the life of a woman that lived outside of the confines of society's expectations of a woman. Simply a brilliant work through which I learned an immense amount of information about a woman I hope to study in more depth in the future.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the eARC of this work in exchange for my honest review.

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In the fall of 2017, I audited a class on 19th century European painting which was largely a class about French artists. I also recently saw a wonderful exhibit on Renoir at the Phillips Collection in DC. So, you can imagine how eagerly I looked forward to reading this biography. Renoir's Dancer absolutely did not disappoint. Renoir's Dancer was Suzanne Valadon, a fascinating woman who was an artist's model and artist in her own right. She was a woman who reinvented herself and evolved from Marie-Clementine to Maria to eventually Suzanne.
The author's writing style is fluid and engaging and the pages kept turning. The book starts with the lives of Suzanne's parents which were fascinating in themselves. Suzanne's early experiences and temperament set the stage for the young adult and adult she would become. While reading Renoir's Dancer, I revisited or learned even more about French history and artists. Such a pleasure to spend time in their company. If you read only one biography this year, make it this one!

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"The pain passes, but the beauty remains." (Pierre-Auguste Renoir)

And sometimes that pain leaves scars unseen with the human eye. Scars kept hidden in the deep folds of life known only by the one who bears their weight.

Catherine Hewitt presents a fascinating glimpse into the life of Suzanne Valadon, artists' model and an eventual artist herself during the gentle and calming wave of the Impressionists movement that revolutionized the art world in France and far beyond.

Hewitt begins her story in 1849 with Madeleine Valadon, a humble linen maid, living with the cattle-dotted pastures of the Bessines countryside. Rituals and folklore surround its inhabitants and these tainted beliefs cause young women to make faulty decisions. Desperate for the eye of an eligible man, Madeleine marries the shift blacksmith, Leger Couland, who is thirteen years her senior. Heartbreak is now chiseled into the steel of her existence. After Leger's death, Madeleine takes her young daughter, Marie-Alix, to the winding streets of Paris searching for a better life.

In time, Madeleine falls, once again, into a sea of carelessness. The widow gives birth to another daughter in 1865. Marie-Clementine (later to be known as Suzanne) has been blessed with flashing blue eyes and fairness of face. Any resemblance to a Christmas angel limits itself as Marie takes to the Paris streets with abandon in her youth. Suzanne with that same youth and lithe agility discovers a talent as a horseback performer in the circus and is quite in demand.

But Hewitt brings the spotlight of her story shifting with the focus on the life of Suzanne Valadon with Renoir, Manet, Monet, and Toulouse Lautrec drifting in and out along the outer perimeter. Valadon visits the cafes and coffee houses of Paris where she is wrapped in the presence of artists, writers, and musicians. Initially, Valadon is embraced for her modeling presence. But a breakthrough arrives as she dabbles in charcoal drawings and later watercolors and oils of her own creation.

Renoir's Dancer reads like fiction, but it is filled with pockets of discoveries within the artists' dens of the time period. Although not as well known as Mary Cassatt and Berthe Morisot, Valadon does what she does best........breaking ground for women and leaving quite the footprints behind.

I received a copy of Renoir's Dancer through NetGalley for an honest review. My thanks to St. Martin's Press and to Catherine Hewitt for the opportunity.

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An excellent biography of Suzanne Valadon, famous for being a model for impressionists but also an artist in her own right. This was a great tale about a woman who refused to cow to gender and traditional stereotypes.

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Anyone who picks up this book expecting a book-length exposé on Renoir’s relationship with one of his favorite models, along with gossipy revelations about Suzanne’s Valadon’s life, is in for a bit of a disappointment.

Yes, part of one chapter does explore in great depth that relationship, which proved to be an early pivotal moment in setting Suzanne Valadon on her artistic career path. And yes, the author, Catherine Hewitt, does address the gossip and rumors that swirled around Valadon’s relationships with many of the artists she modeled for. But those activities are really not the point of this book, as the title and cover may lead you to believe.

So what is the point of this book? It’s to provide a comprehensive, engaging, well-researched, scholarly study of Suzanne Valadon. It’s to elevate the modern readers’ understanding and appreciation of an often-overlooked avant-garde artist who defied categorization, who stuck to her guns in representing the truth as she saw it, and who happened to be female.

Suzanne Valadon was in fact the first French female artist that came from the peasant class to earn a living creating fine art and become internationally renowned in the process (i.e., she was so much more than “Renoir’s dancer”). Yet, at the same time, she resisted being labeled a “female artist” and only sought the recognition that any male artist in her position would’ve so easily come by, as explained in this book.

By tracing the artist’s life from her family’s provincial beginnings, through her work as a model during one of the most exciting periods of French painting, her active engagement in and contributions to Montmartre’s bohemian culture, her relationships with both the French artworld’s elite and its more eccentric characters, her family relationships, and her own artistic explorations, this book provides a complete picture of Suzanne Valadon as a person and as an artist.

Hewitt explains the genesis and development of Valadon’s artistic output and offers insightful interpretations of individual works by adeptly placing them within their appropriate cultural, social, and biographical contexts. I commend the author for achieving, in my view, the perfect balance between background material (social history), biographical accounts of Valadon’s personal life, and discussions of the artworks, which never get tedious.

Though this book is quite scholarly (extensive source citations and bibliography are provided), there is never a dull moment, whether the author is describing Montmartre’s fin-de-siècle nightlife, Paris during wartime, or Valadon’s challenging relationship with her alcoholic son, the famous French painter Maurice Utrillo. Much of that is due to just how interesting a character Valadon was and the times she lived in were—all brought to life in this book’s pages.

In our post-truth world, I found it refreshing that the author stuck to presenting the facts rather than speculating and insisting on interpretations of certain events in Valadon’s life as told by competing accounts. I also appreciated that the life of an important female artist wasn’t used as a pretext for polemical discussions and deconstructions of the “patriarchal hegemony” (a common approach during my graduate student days in art history); but that's not to imply the limitations on and biases against a female artist at the time aren't duly addressed here.

I have to say without personally checking her source material, Hewitt’s treatment of her subject felt very honest, just as Valadon always strove to lay bare the truth of her artistic subjects—both of which make the dishonest title of this book even more striking.

I can certainly understand the publisher’s desire to reach a broader audience with such a sensationalistic title and attractive cover. Someone who picks this up hoping for juicy details about a famous Impressionist’s romantic affairs is in for a real treat and should enjoy this great read nonetheless.

But as a society, aren’t we past diminishing or undermining a female artist’s accomplishments (in any industry) by emphasizing the role men played in getting her there? Or by defining her in terms of the more salacious (“secret life”) aspects of her existence? Certainly, the details need to be covered—in this case, that famous male artists like Degas and Toulouse-Lautrec played essential roles in Valadon’s artistic rise. But female dealers, patrons, collectors, and family members played important roles as well, also covered in this book.

In the weeks before this book’s publication, I can only hope the publisher “gets woke” and changes the cover to feature an artwork actually created by Valadon and moves the artist’s name to the left side of the title’s colon, thereby creating a cover worthy of the book’s contents and of the artist herself.

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