From Publishers Weekly
A founder of impressionism, Berthe Morisot (1840-1895) painted "safely feminine" themes--family or friends, domestic interiors, vacation spots, parks. In the bourgeois, sexist world of 19th-century France, "it would have been unthinkable for her to paint the kinds of brothel scenes Degas did, or even pictures of train stations like Manet's," writes Higonnet, a Wellesley art professor. Yet Morisot, a strong-willed pioneer, brought to her analytical scenes a distinctly feminine point of view, portraying women in moments of self-awareness. This luminous biography shows what Morisot had to overcome to be an artist, and how much she accomplished. Her marriage to Eugene Manet, brother of famed painter Edouard, provided stability. At 37 Morisot gave birth to Julie, soon to figure in the artist's sensitive explorations of the mother-daughter relationship. Higonnet's class-conscious, feminist group portrait of the impressionist circle is on-target. Illustrations. Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Higonnet, an art historian whose dissertation on Morisot was researched with the help of the artist's descendants, here presents a well-written, sometimes eloquent biography of the Impressionist artist. She argues that Morisot developed a strategy to portray "a feminine visual culture" in an "extremely daring unfeminine career while making minimal personal sacrifices." Morisot's personality emerges clearly with the help of material from unpublished sources; women friends are discussed along with family. Specialists will find fault with some rash comments, but overall this is a well argued and convincing study. To moderate Higonnet's hyperbole, serious collections should also acquire Charles F. Stuckey and others' Berthe Morisot--Impressionist (Hudson Hills Pr., dist. by Rizzoli, 1987). Recommended.- Mary Hamel-Schwulst, Tow son State Univ., Md.Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.


Anne Truitt, New York Times Book Review
"[Anne Higonnet] has written Morisot's biography with a scrupulous honesty that resists temptations of impertinent interpretation. Drawing on previously unpublished journals and letters, Ms. Higonnet delineates the facts of Morisot's life as if with an incisive etching tool; her cool, logical pen makes a contrast to the supple brush with which Morisot caught transient light. . . . An important introduction to an extraordinary achievement."


Entertainment Weekly
"A memorable portrait of an admirable woman, as elegantly simple and light in touch as a Manet, or a Morisot."


Christine Temin, The Boston Globe
"[A] superb biography. . . . With great skill, Higonnet sets Morisot's story against the backdrop of 19th-century art and politics."


Felicia Kornbluh, Women's Review of Books
"Anne Higonnet makes an excellent case for re-routing our assumptions about artistic achievement. And she makes it imperative that we reconsider the achievements of Berthe Morisot."


Book Description
Of the six Impressionist painters whose first exhibition scandalized and fascinated Paris in 1874, Berthe Morisot was the only woman. She reached a pinnacle of artistic achievement despite the restraints society placed on her sex, adroitly combining her artistic ambitions with a rewarding family life. Anne Higonnet brings fully to life an accomplished artist and her world.


About the Author
Anne Higonnet is Associate Professor of Art History at Wellesley College and the author of Berthe Morisot's Images of Women (1992).

FROM THE PUBLISHER