Louise Leghait, also known as Louise Le Ghait (9 September 1821 - 22 April 1874), was a Belgian photographer active during the 1850s in Brussels and Paris. She is considered to be the first Belgian woman who worked as an amateur photographer.
Louise Leghait | |
|---|---|
| Born | Louise Félicité Julie Reynders 9 September 1821 |
| Died | 22 April 1874 (aged 52) |
| Other names | Louise Le Ghait |
| Occupation | Photographer |
| Years active | 1850s |
Personal life
editLouise Félicité Julie Reynders was born on 9 September 1821 in Brussels. She was the daughter of Jean Paul Ferdinand Reynders, a Brussels-based merchant born in Amsterdam in 1795 who married in Tournai in 1818. In 1840, at the age of eighteen, she married Gustave Nicolas François Leghait, a landowner, in Saint-Josse-ten-Noode and had three children with him: Alfred (1841) who became the Belgian Ambassador to France in 1903, Jenny (1843) and Raoul (1845).[1][2]
Photography
editIn the mid-1850s, Louise Leghait emerged as a photographer in Brussels under the name Madame Leghait. She is considered to be Belgium's first female calotypist and amateur photographer.[3] In 1856, she became the first woman member of the Société française de photographie.[2][4][5] Shortly afterwards, she was awarded a medal at the l'Exposition des arts industriels de Bruxelles (Brussels Industrial Arts Exhibition), along with her male counterparts Constant Delessert, Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard and Louis Adolphe Humbert de Molard.[6]
The following year, she presented a series of photographic views of Mechelen, Brussels and Antwerp on at the second exhibition of the Société française de photographie.[2][7] The press noted that Belgium was represented by "une dame, un artiste véritable, Mme Leghait, tient le premier rang" (Mme Leghait, a woman and artist of first rank),[8] praised her technical skill, "all the more remarkable in a woman of the world who is guided only by her love of art"[9] stating that she "exhibited pieces that closely resemble English photographs in terms of finesse and sharpness of line".[10] After this date, few traces of her work remain.
Later life
editHer youngest son Raoul died in 1871, aged only twenty-five, and her husband died the following year.[11][12] Louise Leghait died two years later at her home at 12 rond-point des Champs-Élysées in Paris on 22 April 1874.[2][13]
Collections
editPrints held by the Société française de photographie.[14]
Exhibitions
edit- November 1981 - February 1982. La Femme artiste: d'Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun à Rosa Bonheur, Mont-de-Marsan, musée Despiau-Wlérick, donjon Lacataye
- 4 October 2015 - 24 January 2016. Qui a peur des femmes photographes? Paris, musée d'Orsay, musée de l'Orangerie.[5] Works lent by the Société française de photographie.[15]
References
edit- ^ "Acte de mariage n° 46 du 11 août 1840, Saint-Josse-ten-Node, Archives de l'État, Belgique".
- ^ a b c d Hélène Bocard, Louise Leghait, in Luce Lebart et Marie Robert (dir.), Une histoire mondiale des femmes photographes, Éditions Textuel, 2020, p. 37
- ^ "Le Ghait, Louise (Madame) - FoMu". fomu.atomis.be. Retrieved 2020-06-20..
- ^ Bulletin de la Société française de photographie (in French). Paris: Société française de photographie. 1856. p. 325. Retrieved 2020-06-20..
- ^ a b "Qui a peur des femmes photographes ? 1839 à 1919". site du Musée de l'Orangerie. Retrieved 2020-06-20..
- ^ "Chronique". L'Art du XIXe siècle : Revue mensuelle : Beaux-arts appliqués à l'industrie, romans, chroniques (in French). March 1856. p. 260. Retrieved 2020-06-20 – via Gallica..
- ^ Marie-Christine Claes, J. B. A. M. Jobard (1792-1861): visionnaire de nouveaux rapports entre l'art et l'industrie, acteur privilégié des mutations de l'image en Belgique au XIXe siècle, thèse présentée pour l'obtention du grade de docteur en Philosophie et Lettres; Promoteur: Professeur Ralph Dekoninck, Université Catholique de Louvain, Faculté de Philosophie et Lettres, Département d'Archéologie et d'Histoire de l'Art, Louvain-la-Neuve, année académique 2006-2007, p. 119.
- ^ F.-B. Boisdenier (15 March 1857). "Exposition annuelle de la Société française de photographie (suite)". Le Siècle (in French). p. 3 – via RetroNews - Le site de presse de la BnF.
- ^ Bulletin de la Société française de photographie (in French). Société française de photographie. 1857. p. 267. Retrieved 2020-06-20..
- ^ Faucheux (1857). "Exposition de la Société française de photographie in Revue universelle des arts". Gallica (in French). p. 69. Retrieved 2020-06-24.
- ^ "Généalogie de Raoul Fernand Victor Leghait". Geneanet (in French). Retrieved 2020-06-20.
- ^ "Généalogie de Gustave Nicolas François Leghait". Geneanet (in French). Retrieved 2020-06-24..
- ^ "Décès et inhumations". Le Pays : Journal des volontés de la France (in French). 1874-04-27. p. 4 – via Gallica..
- ^ "Tirages LEGHAIT 0242.pdf" (PDF).
- ^ "Du Brésil au Musée d'Orsay, près de 80 images de la SFP ont été prêtées pour des expositions en 2015 - COLLECTION SFP". sfp.asso.fr. Retrieved 2023-09-01.
