Women sculptors at the Camille Claudel Museum

 

Yvonne Serruys: Colin Maillard (Blind Man's Bluff) 1909  Private Collection

The present exhibition at the Camille Claudel Museum in Nogent sur Seine, pays tribute to a group of women sculptors who were well-known in their day but have since been largely forgotten. Their day was the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. Yvonnes Serruys' work, above, follows in the wake of Camille Claudel's spontaneous nude figures.

William Blair Bruce: Femme Sculpteur (Woman sculptor) 

Swedish sculptor, Carolina Benedicks (1856-1935) married a Canadian painter, William Blair Bruce, and the two artists supported each other. Carolina is recognisable in the above painting by her husband.  The double bust below by Carolina shows the artistic couple, William lovingly assisting his wife:

Carolina Benedicks-Bruce: Self portrait with husband William Blair Bruce 1897
Själsö, Konstnärshemmet Brucebo, Sweden

Women had an advantage if they were of an artistic family or were helped by their entourage. They exhibited at the annual Salon and were celebrated like the male sculptors. Rodin and Camille Claudel inspired many of them. Claudel's "Waltz" was an avant-garde work seen by fellow sculptresses:

Camille Claudel: La Valse (Waltz) circa 1893 

The exhibition contrasts Rodin and Claudel with contemporary sculptresses, some of whom are fairly conservative and traditional. Anna Bass (1876 - 1961) depicts a young woman awakening. She is portrayed in a realistic, barely idealised, fashion (one pities the poor model holding that pose!):

Anna Bass: Le Jeune Eveil (The Young Awakening) before 1935
Strasbourg, musée d'Art moderne et contemporain

Anna Bass's female torso contains sensuality in its realism:

Anna Bass: Torse de femme (Female torso) before 1938  Roubaix, La Piscine

Nothing is known about the end of Anna Bass's life- she fell into obscurity. Her teacher was Jane Poupelet, who created the following realistic figure at her 'toilette':

Jane Poupelet: Femme à sa toilette (Woman at her toilette) 1907-10
Collection Maître Vincent Wapler 

Poupelet was the first woman to be admitted to the municipal arts school in Bordeaux. She held firm feminist convictions. In her sculptures, mainly of female nudes and animals, she explored the pure lines of a composition, having nothing to do with mythology or idealism. She could be quite radical, as in the following work:

Jane Poupelet: Imploration (Supplication) 1928  Maître Vincent Wapler Collection

Jane Poupelet's headless enigma is rather different from Claudel's expressive "Supplication" of twenty three years earlier:

Camille Claudel: L'Implorante or Imploration (The Implorer or Supplication) 1905

 It was in private schools that women sculptors met each other, as they were denied the State Arts School until 1900. Camille Claudel, from a fairly wealthy family, hired a studio along with some colleagues in the rue Notre Dame des Champs, not far from the Académie Colarossi where she had met several other women, often foreigners. Her best friend at the time was an English girl called Jessie Lipscomb. The busts they made of each other have been reunited for this exhibition:

Camille Claudel portrayed by Jessie Lipscomb circa 1883-6  Private Collection

Jesse Lipscomb portrayed by Camille Claudel circa 1883-7 Private Collection

The emotion and vigour present in the figure Claudel was modelling (see below) contrasts with Lipscomb's more mundane work:

Lipscomb: Femme s'étirant (Woman stretching) circa 1887  Private Collection

 

Claudel: L'Abandon (Abandonment) 1905 Beaux Arts de Cambrai

The photo behind shows the two girls working side by side. They quarrelled soon after this. Jessie paid Camille a visit much later in the asylum in 1929. This is a photo of the girls taken in the Colarossi Academy:

From left to right: Amy Singer, friend and colleague, Camille Claudel, Jessie Lipscomb, William Elborne (Jessie's fiancé) in their studio, 117 rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs

Several of the apprentice women sculptors became Rodin's assistants, who was engaged in creating his "Gates of Hell" and his "Burghers of Calais" at the time. Madeleine Jouvray was first a pupil, then a practician helping Rodin chisel his marble statues; she embraced Rodin's style:

Madeleine Jouvray(1862-1935): Bacchante  circa 1886 Musée Antoine Vivenel, Compiègne

The above sculpture was a gift to the Compiègne museum by Nathaniel Rothschild. It was based on a portrait of Madeleine's friend Sigrid af Forselles, from Finland. In return, Madeleine was portrayed in the work called "Youth" by Sigrid (1860-1935):

Sigrid af Forselles: Jeunesse (Youth) circa 1883 Loviisa Town Museum, Finland

The women artists portrayed and helped each other, but there were jealousies too. Camille Claudel complained bitterly in a letter to her brother that a work by Scandinavian sculptress, Agnės de Frumerie (1869-1937), was a plagiarism of her own work "The Gossips":

Claudel: Les Causeuses (The Gossips) 1893

Agnès had come to Paris in 1892 on a grant from the Academy of fine arts in Stockholm and later led a prolific career as a sculptor and ceramic artist, while marrying a Frenchman. Her work "The Old Women" is not very similar to Claudel's, but perhaps she may have borrowed the idea:

Agnės de Frumerie: Les Commėres (The Gossips)  1908
Skara,Västergötlands museum, Sweden

A comparison of the the two works shows how timeless Claudel's sculptures are, with their naked figures full of expression, while Agnès's are fixed in time and more anecdotal. To be compared with Claudel's "Waltz" (above), Agnès's enameled blue stone vase with swirling elves tends towards the Art Nouveau style :

 

Agnės de Frumerie: Les Elfes or Danse des Elfes (Elves or Dance of the Elves) 1896  Châtillon 

De Frumerie's Art Nouveau vase below is influenced in its decor by Claudel and Rodin. It shows the four ages of woman. This is the side with the old woman:

Agnės de Frumerie: Vase des quatre âges de la vie (Four ages of life vase) circa 1898
Skara, Västergötlands museum, Sweden

Agnès de la Frumerie shows a striking similarity with both Camille Claudel and Rodin with his figure of the old haggard lady:

Rodin: Celle qui fut la belle Heaulmière (She who was the helmet maker's beautiful wife)   1885-7 Paris, musée Rodin

Rodin's work, a reference to François Villon's poem, is a meditation on human decrepitude.

There are several works by Rodin in the show, including his iconic "Age of bronze", which at the time  was criticised for having been modelled directly on the subject's body (It wasn't):

Rodin: L'Age d'airain (Age of Bronze) 1877  Musée Rodin, Paris 

 Claudel did many preparatory drawings, as did Rodin. In this large sketch of her younger sister Louise, which is the only known existing pastel by her, the background is influenced by Japanese art:

Camille Claudel: Louise Claudel  circa 1887 Nogent-sur-Seine, musée Camille Claudel

There was jealousy in the Claudel family, Louise siding with their mother, while  

Prosper, the father always supported Camille and sadly it was just after his death that Camille was committed to an asylum and never let out to come back to live with her family. Her mother was no doubt ashamed of the scandal and her brother Paul was living in different parts of the world as an ambassador. Louise married a middle-class man Ferdinand de Massary, whom Camille portrayed in her energetic style:

Claudel: Ferdinand de Massary 1888  musée Camille Claudel, Nogent-sur-Seine

The exhibition is a refreshing look at sculpture by women, and it is interesting to compare their works with similar ones by their male teachers. In the following picture the work by the male teacher, Boucher, is on the left and the female pupil's, Laure Coutan-Montorgueil, on the right. Boucher's idealised sensual forms contrast with the more directly realistic work by Laure Coutan-Montorgueil, but the two figures are very similar. Their smooth bodies contrast with the rough rock. :

Baigneuse (Bather) by Alfred Boucher 1896 musée Camille Claudel, Nogent-sur-Seine  and La Source (The source) by Laure Coutan-Montorgueil, 1896  Bourges, musée du Berry

The period covered by this exhibition is that of Camille Claudel's active years as sculptress, from when she joined the Paris scene in 1882 until her committal to the asylum in 1913. She stayed there for thirty years and died in 1943. The following year French women got the vote. 

The exhibition later travels to Tours and Pont-Aven in Brittany. It is at the Camille Claudel Museum in Nogent-sur-Seine, an hour's train ride from Paris from 13th September, 2025 until 4th January, 2026  

"Etre sculptrice à Paris au temps de Camille Claudel (Being a sculptress in Paris at the time of Camille Claudel), Musée Camille Claudel, 10 rue Gustave Flaubert, 10400 Nogent-sur-Seine.

Open Wednesday to Sunday 10am to 5pm (until 6pm on Fridays). Closed Monday and Tuesday.

See also my earlier article about this museum.

*******************************