An astonishing painting and a mystery solved - a portrait of Laure Hayman by Federico de Madrazo y Ochoa, circa 1900-1910

I found an image of this outrageous painting some time ago. I saved it to one of my blog files, intending to use it in a "Randomly" post, posts I like to fill with odd or surprising things to go along with those that are merely beautiful. But at the last moment, intrigued by the painting - a decidedly middle-aged woman posed undraped to the waist and clearly enamored of her own prodigious breasts, a work beautifully painted and obviously a portrait, but with the sitter unidentified - I had to try and find out more. I hunted for other appearances of the painting on the internet, but only found one, from when the painting was being auctioned in Barcelona three years ago. Again, only the painter was identified, and there was no other information listed on the site. But... the auction house included pictures of the back of the painting, not an uncommon thing, often included to show the overall condition of a piece to potential bidders. And on the back of the frame were scrawled, one over the other, two names: "Gladys Harvey" and "'O--- de Crécy."

The first meant nothing to me but, even though I've never read La Recherche - embarrassed to say! - the name de Crécy was familiar to me as one of Proust's characters. I thought perhaps this Gladys Harvey might be the author's model for Odette, the future madame Swann. After hunting a bit more I came to understand that Gladys Harvey was also a fictional character, one in a short story of the same name by Paul Bourget. (It's said that soon after meeting the teen-aged Proust, the model for both characters gave the writer a copy of Bourget's story bound in the silk of one of her petticoats.) After just a bit more searching I came upon the name of the real woman - Laure Hayman - who had inspired the two writers. And comparing other images of Hayman with the subject of the painting I feel quite certain that this is the celebrated courtesan, herself. Now, as to when exactly the portrait was painted and, more, why, I don't expect I'll ever know.

*

Portrait by Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta - father of the featured artist - circa 1880s.

Laure Hayman (11 June 1851 Valparaiso -1932 or 1939 Monaco), famous demi-mondaine of the Belle Epoque. Of Belgian, French, Creole, and English origins and a descendant of the painter Francis Hayman, the master of Thomas Gainsborough, she was born in Chile, the daughter of an engineer. After her father's death, and apparently encouraged by her mother, she became a courtesan. Numbered among her reputed lovers were the duc d'Orléans, Charles de La Rochefoucauld, King George I of Greece, Charles-Egon IV zu Fürstenberg, Louis Weil - great-uncle of Marcel Proust - and Adrien Proust, father of the writer. But it's said that her only true love was Prince Alexis Karageorgevich, a pretender to the throne of Serbia, living in exile in Paris. For many years she lived on the generosity of the Dutch-born French banker Raphaël Bischoffsheim, and the salon she gathered at her hôtel particulier at 4 rue Lapérouse - she would later move to 34 avenue du Président-Wilson - became known for its brilliance. In 1888 the seventeen year old Marcel Proust first met her there, soon becoming an habitué of her salon and a close friend. If she is remembered now it is really only because she served as the main model for Proust's Odette de Crécy in his À la recherche du temps perdu. But she also had a real talent as a sculptor; she exhibited at the Salon d'Automne in 1905, gaining much positive notice, and showed her work at the Galerie Georges Petit in 1913. Many well-known artists - including Isadora Duncan - served as her models. Information about her life, particularly her later life, seems to be scarce, even as to the date of her death when she was either eighty-one or eighty-eight.

Photograph by Nadar, 1879

Pastel portrait by Julius Leblanc Stewart, 1882.

Photograph by Benque et Cie, circa 1880s.

Circa 1905-10.

*

Federico de Madrazo y Ochoa (1875, Rome - 1934, Madrid), Spanish painter who worked mostly in Madrid and Paris. He was part of a famous family of Spanish artists which included his father Raimundo de Madrazo y Garreta, his uncle Ricardo de Madrazo y Garreta, his grandfather, Federico de Madrazo y Kuntz, and his great-grandfather José de Madrazo y Agudo.