- Sophie Fremiet
Sophie Fremiet (
16 June 1797 –4 December 1867 ) was a French painter.Born in
Dijon , her father was the assistant curator of the city's museum, a patron of artists and a ferventBonapartist . Sophie was taught byAnatole Devosge , a former pupil ofJacques-Louis David . Her father supported the work of a young Dijon sculptor,François Rude .In the aftermath of the second
Bourbon Restoration in 1815, the Fremiet family, along with many other Bonapartists, left France forBrussels (nowBelgium , then part of the newly createdUnited Kingdom of the Netherlands ). Here Sophie studied under another French exile, her former teacher's master, Jacques-Louis David. She worked as David's copyist and exhibited her own works in Brussels and inAntwerp . In 1820, her "Belle Anthia" was a great success at an exhibition inGhent On
25 July 1821 , Sophie married her father's former protégé François Rude. The couple would have only one child, Amédée, who died young in 1830. In Brussels Sophie was a successful artist, receiving many commissions, including several for the former royal palace atTervuren , lost in the fire that destroyed it. Her works were neoclassicist in style, largely mythological, although she produced a small number of religious paintings.In 1826, the Rude family returned to France, settling in
Paris . Here Sophie began to paint historical scenes. She served as the model for the female figure representing France in her husband's statue "La Marseillaise", which forms part of theArc de Triomphe . François Rude died in 1855, and Sophie devoted the rest of her life to exhibiting and publicising her husband's work.She died in Paris.
References
Geiger, Monique, "FREMIET, Sophie" in E. Gubin, C. Jacques, V. Piette & J. Puissant (eds), "Dictionnaire des femmes belges: XIXe et XXe siècles." Bruxelles: Éditions Racine, 2006. ISBN 2-87386-434-6
Further reading
* Geiger, Monique, "Sophie Rude peintre et femme de sculpteur, une vie d'artiste au XIXe siècle (Dijon - Bruxelles - Paris)." Dijon, Société des amis des Musées de Dijon, 2004. ISBN 2-9523255-0-2
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.