In the Footsteps of Rosa Bonheur and Photography

The bicentenary of Rosa Bonheur’s birth on March 16, 2022, kicked off a year of publications and cultural events, offering an opportunity to rediscover the work of a strong woman who was famous during her lifetime but quickly forgotten after her death at the age of 77 on May 25, 1899. “Le musée des œuvres disparues” (“The Museum of Lost Works”), an exhibition currently at the Château de By in Thomery (Seine-et-Marne), presents some of the finds made by Katherine Brault and her daughters, who have owned the property since 2017. With help from archivist Michel Pons, they have set about cataloging and classifying the thousands of objects and documents found in the vast residence where Bonheur spent the last 40 years of her life, including glass plates, paper prints and photography equipment. At first glance, the polished style of the Second Empire’s most famous animal painter, her attention to detail and texture and traditional techniques and subjects suggest that she wanted to remain outside her time, but this would ignore her adventurous temperament. Some contemporary critics called it “photographic” realism. Enthusiastic and inquisitive about everything, Bonheur was a frequent visitor to the Jardin des Plantes in Paris and deeply interested in the natural and veterinary sciences. She built a fine science library at the…