The love story of a 22-year-old model buried in the same grave with the artist Modigliani on the same day

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The name of Jeanne Hébuterne is inseparable from the name of Amedeo Modigliani. The amazing and tragic truth is that it was death, not life, that bound them together forever. Jeanne committed suicide the day after Modigliani's death and was buried in the same grave. She did not live to see her 22nd birthday.

Acquaintance

In the spring of 1917, Modigliani was introduced to a lovely 19-year-old art student named Jeanne Hébuterne. They met at the Accademia Colarossi. Modigliani also visited the academy to paint portraits of models. Jeanne had a beautiful amphora-like figure. The swinging gait of the girl in high heels resembled the movement of seaweed. She had an unusually pale complexion and gorgeous brown hair. Jeanne was silent, even melancholy. Contemporaries recalled that her gaze was serious and deep.

The sculptor Hannah Orloff, their mutual friend, helped them get to know each other. When Modigliani began dating Jeanne, all his friends and the entire bohemian environment recognized her as his legal wife. Before meeting him, Jeanette (as everyone called her) did not belong to the Bohemians, although she was known as a young artist and student at the Accademia Colarossi. Jeanne had to disown her devout Roman Catholic family for having an affair with Modigliani, whom his family considered unworthy of their daughter. Despite her family's objections, they soon began living together.

Jeanne became Modigliani's main model. The artist has portrayed his beloved in more than twenty works. In 1918, the artist and his model left Paris and went to Nice and Cagnes-sur-Mer. On November 29, 1918, Jeanne gave birth to a daughter whom they named Jeanne. And six months later, Hébuterne became pregnant again. Modigliani officially recognized his daughter and became engaged to Jeanne, despite the fact that the latter's parents were against the marriage (the main reason is Modigliani's reputation as an alcoholic and drug addict). The plans of a happy family were not destined to come true. And the parents weren't the problem. Modigliani discovered that he had severe tuberculosis.

Jeanne's family

Jeanne came from an ordinary petty bourgeois family who lived in the Latin Quarter near the Pantheon. Her father, a senior accountant at a department store, was fond of 17th century French literature. Jeanne had a brother, Andre, who was four years older than her sister. Children began to show their artistic talent early. And parents, in part, encouraged their inclinations, convincing children that talent could make them famous and wealthy. Jeanne followed the example of her older brother and began to study painting at the School of Decorative Arts.

Jeanne's parents were ordinary people who adored their children and wished only the best for them. And therefore it is quite natural that the connection of their beloved daughter with an artist with a dubious reputation was unacceptable to them. In the beginning, the parents did not know about the relationship between their daughter and the famous painter with a bad reputation, who was 14 years older than Jeanne. When the relationship between the two lovers began, Amedeo and Jeanne never parted, although for Jeanne it was a great moral sacrifice. She had to deceive her parents and beloved brother, hiding the truth about the affair with Modigliani. In March 1918, Jeanne's mother learned that her daughter was pregnant. 23-year-old Andre actually broke off relations with his sister. Subsequently, the parents gradually came to terms with the situation, seeing how deeply their daughter was in love.

Jeanne's artistic talent

Jeanne began painting two years before meeting Modigliani. She created numerous pencil drawings and watercolors. But Jeanne has never exhibited and did not have any contracts with galleries. No doubt Modigliani appreciated her talent, but being the most ruthless critic of his work, he knew from his own experience how much work he had to do to become Modigliani. This explains why he never exhibited Jeanne's work next to his own, although he himself did not live to see the recognition of his work.

Subsequently, Modigliani, of course, influenced the work of Jeanne. However, despite all the influence of Modigliani, their works on common themes show significant differences. Jeanne was more attentive to the details of the interior, in which they prepared portraits of their friends. Working on a close-up or portrait against a colored background, Modigliani focused on the inner world of the hero, while Jeanne did not draw clear lines between the model and the background. There are notable differences in the way Jeanne and Amedeo described the same models in their canvases.

Tragedy

Jeanne Hébuterne really was selflessly in love with Modigliani, but could not make him give up alcohol and drugs. And nothing could be done about his chronic tuberculosis, which ultimately took his life. She was his guardian angel, muse and model for most of his paintings.

No one can be blamed for what happened in January 1920. Jeanne has always been very melancholic. According to Stanislav Fumet, a close friend of Andre and Jeanne, the girl talked about death and suicide even at the age of 17. Such thoughts increasingly attacked her during the period of her acquaintance and life with Modigliani: lack of honesty with her parents, the birth of an illegitimate daughter, resentment of her brother, endless poverty, unheated housing, a second pregnancy and Modigliani's incurable diseases and habits … All this inevitably led Jeanne to depression …

On January 24, 1920, Amedeo Modigliani died of tuberculosis. Jeanne Hébuterne's family brought her to their home. The day after Modigliani's death, Jeanne threw herself from the window of an apartment on the fifth floor, killing both herself and her unborn child. Modigliani's funeral epitaph reads: "Death overtook him on the threshold of fame", Jeanne's epitaph: "The devoted companion of the victim."