Dora Maar (1907–1997)

Dora Maar was the pseudonym of Henriette Théodora Markovitch, born in Paris, the only daughter of Joseph Markovitch, a Croatian-born architect, and his French wife, Louise-Julie Voisin. She was raised mostly in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where her father had obtained commissions. In 1926, the family returned to Paris. She enrolled in the École des Beaux-Arts and the Académie Julian to study painting, and then took classes in photography at the École de Photographie de la Ville de Paris. She took photos documenting the effects of the Great Depression, and had her first publication in the magazine Art et Métiers Graphiques in 1932. Under the professional name Dora Maar, she set up her own commercial photography studio and became a star in avant-garde and Surrealist art circles that included Jacqueline Lamba, André Breton, and George Bataille. Her photograph Père Ubu (1936) served as an emblem for the movement after it was exhibited at the International Surrealist Exhibition in London. In 1936, she met Pablo Picasso and went on to become his lover, muse, and principal model for nearly 10 highly tempestuous years. During this time, she took many striking portrait photos of artists and intellectuals of the era, and documented Picasso's painting Guernica in its many stages. When their relationship ended, she withdrew to a house in Ménerbes, in the Vaucluse, where she lived alone and painted. She did many still lifes and landscapes of the region near her home. Gradually, she returned to photography, and returned to live in Paris before her death.