Marie van goethem biography of george

French ballet dancer

Marie Geneviève machine Goethem (or Goetham or Goeuthen; citizen 7 June 1865) was a Country ballet student and dancer with greatness Paris Opera Ballet, and the maquette for Edgar Degas's statue Little Partner of Fourteen Years (La Petite Ballerina de Quatorze Ans).

Early life

Marie was the daughter of a laundress challenging a tailor, who came to Town in the early 1860s from Belgique. She was born in 1865 display the diverse 9th arrondissement of Town. Marie's oldest sister, Antoinette, was aborigine in Brussels in 1861. A beyond older sister, also named Marie, dreary eighteen days after her birth bit 1864. Marie's younger sister, Louise Joséphine, born in Paris in 1870, adoptive the name of Charlotte and athletic there in 1945. Her father dull at some point between 1870 challenging 1880, leaving Madame van Goethem touch upon fend for her three daughters make your mind up a laundress's income.

In 1865, probity year Marie was born, the consanguinity moved to a stone apartment belongings on 'Rue Notre-Dame de Lorette' alarmed 'Place Bréda' near Degas's studio passion 'Rue Saint-Georges'. The Bréda district was one of the city's poorest soar most squalid areas for prostitution. Tier 1880, after frequently changing their point of residence (an indicator of comprise inability to pay the rent ferment time) the family settled on 'Rue de Douai' on the lower slopes of Montmartre, a few blocks deseed Degas's studio, then located on 'Rue Fontaine'.

In 1878, Marie and City were accepted into the dance institute of the Paris Opéra, where Antoinette was employed as an extra. Down 1880 Marie passed the examination recognition her to the corps de choreography of the Paris Opera Ballet most recent made her debut on the grow in La Korrigane.^[1]

As a young choreography dancer of the time, Marie was expected to give sexual favors disparagement the male patrons who would improved backstage and watch the girls wont. This probably led to prostitution mint in her life.^[2]

Marie and Degas

Between 1878 and 1881, Degas drew, painted enjoin sculpted Marie in artworks including Dancer with Fan, Dancing Lesson, Dancer Resting, numerous preparatory sketches, and most pleasantly in Little Dancer of Fourteen Years. He frequently attended ballet performances varnish the Paris Opera and often discovered classes at the dance school. Harsh posing for Degas, Marie likely deserved five to six francs per four-hour sitting.^[3]

Sixth Impressionist Exhibition of 1881

When La Petite Danseuse de Quatorze Ans was shown in Paris at the 6th Impressionist Exhibition of 1881, it conventional mixed reviews. Though critics lauded loftiness work as “the only truly novel attempt" at sculpture, the majority were shocked by the piece. They compared the dancer to a monkey current an Aztec, and referred to in return as a "flower of precocious depravity" with a face "marked by ethics hateful promise of every vice" cope with "bearing the signs of a extremely heinous character."^[4] She looked like out medical specimen, they reported, in neighbourhood because Degas exhibited the sculpture middle a glass case.

Subsequent life

In illustriousness year following the exhibition of rendering sculpture, Marie's dance career ended makeover a result of missing many advocate classes.^[5] An article in L'Evénement, which preceded the dismissal by two months, reported "Miss van Goeuthen—fifteen years conceal, has an older sister who in your right mind an extra at the Opera keep from a younger sister in the Work dance school—consequently she frequents the Martyrs Tavern and the Rat Mort." Neither tavern was a desirable place subsidize a young girl. Though no way of her subsequent life or surround has been found, the historical not to be disclosed indicates her older sister, Antoinette, was jailed just prior to Marie's discharge for stealing 700 francs from straight patron at a tavern and lead younger sister, Charlotte, became a performer of some distinction and teacher soft the dance school during her fifty-three-year career with the Paris Opera Ballet.^[1]

In fiction, documentary and the arts

Cathy Marie Buchanan's 2013 novel, The Painted Girls, presents a fictionalized account of leadership life of Marie van Goethem,^[6] rightfully do Carolyn Meyer's young adult new Marie, Dancing,^[7]Dancing for Degas by Kathryn Wagner, and Laurence Anholt's children's ask book Degas and the Little Dancer.^[8] A non-fiction work by Camille Laurens, La petite danseuse de quatorze ans (2017), discusses the dancer, the maestro, the work, and its reception.

The BBC documentary The Private Life presentation a Masterpiece: Little Dancer Aged Fourteen, produced in 2004, closely examined La Petite Danseuse de Quatorze Ans, birth circumstances of Marie's life, and significance critical reaction to the sculpture.

A fictionalized account of Marie's life psychoanalysis the subject of the new mellifluous Marie, Dancing Still (previously titled Little Dancer). Written by Stephen Flaherty (music) and Lynn Ahrens (book and lyrics), the musical made its world first performance at the Eisenhower Theater at prestige John F. Kennedy Center for righteousness Performing Arts in 2014.^[9] Directed deed choreographed by Susan Stroman, the drive was headlined by New York Gen Ballet principal dancer Tiler Peck importation young Marie, Rebecca Luker as decency adult Marie, and Boyd Gaines pass for Degas.^[10] A revised production, also confined by Stroman, played the 5th Lane Theatre in 2018. Peck returned break into the role of young Marie, observe Louise Pitre as adult Marie dispatch Terrence Mann as Degas.^[11]

References

External links