Jeanne Modigliani (born Giovanna Hébuterne, 29 November 1918 – 27 July 1984) was an Italian-French historian of Jewish art mostly known for her biographical research on her father, artist

Amedeo Modigliani Amedeo Clemente Modigliani (; ; 12 July 1884 – 24 January 1920) was an Italian painter and sculptor of the École de Paris who worked mainly in France. He is known for portraits and nudes in a modern art, modern style characterized by a surre ...

. In 1958 she wrote the book ''Modigliani: Man and Myth'', later translated into English from the Italian by Esther Rowland Clifford.

Early life

Jeanne's father,

, was an Italian Jewish artist who worked mainly in France. Primarily a figurative artist, he became known for paintings and sculptures in a modern style characterised by mask-like faces (without eyes) and elongation of form. He died in 1920 of

tubercular meningitis Tuberculous meningitis, also known as TB meningitis or tubercular meningitis, is a specific type of bacterial meningitis caused by the ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' infection of the meninges—the system of membranes which envelop the central ner ...

, exacerbated by poverty, overwork, and addiction to alcohol and narcotics. Her mother,

Jeanne Hébuterne Jeanne Hébuterne (; 6 April 1898 – 26 January 1920) was a French painter and art model best known as the frequent subject and Common-law marriage, common-law wife of the artist Amedeo Modigliani. She died by suicide two days after Modigliani ...

, was a French artist, best known as Amedeo Modigliani's frequent subject and common-law wife. When Modigliani died, on January 24, 1920, the twenty-one-year-old Hébuterne was eight months pregnant with their second child. A day after Modigliani's death, Hébuterne was taken to her parents' home. There, inconsolable, deeply depressed, eight months pregnant, and in despair, she threw herself out of a fifth-floor window, killing herself and her unborn second child. Her daughter, Jeanne, who was named after her, was only 14 months old. After her parents' deaths the fourteen-month-old orphan Jeanne was brought to Italy and raised by her paternal grandparents and by her paternal aunt, who adopted her, in the Modigliani hometown of Livorno, where she spent her childhood. She then graduated in art history in Florence.

World War II

Jeanne first married the Italian Jewish economist and journalist Mario Cesare Silvio Levi (born 1905), brother of the more famous

Natalia Ginzburg Natalia Ginzburg (, ; ; 14 July 1916 – 7 October 1991) was an Italian author whose work explored family relationships, politics during and after the Fascist years and World War II, and philosophy. She wrote novels, short stories and essays, f ...

. She later was identified and persecuted as a Jew by the fascists, fleeing to Paris. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, she participated in the

French Resistance The French Resistance ( ) was a collection of groups that fought the German military administration in occupied France during World War II, Nazi occupation and the Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy#France, collaborationist Vic ...

. During this time she met another Resistance fighter, Valdemar "Valdi" Nechtschein (his ''nom de guerre'' was Victor Leduc), who was also married. They began an affair, and in May 1946, Jeanne gave birth to their daughter, Anne. Eventually, both divorced their spouses and married one another. Their second daughter together, Laure, was born in 1951.

Later life

Jeanne married Mario Levi during the Second World War allegedly to assist Levi's legal residency in France, they divorced shortly afterwards. Jeanne and Valdemar Nechtschein divorced in 1980. Following a fall that caused a

cerebral hemorrhage Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), also known as hemorrhagic stroke, is a sudden bleeding into the tissues of the brain (i.e. the parenchyma), into its ventricles, or into both. An ICH is a type of bleeding within the skull and one kind of stro ...

, Jeanne died in a Paris hospital in 1984.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Modigliani, Jeanne 1918 births 1984 deaths 20th-century biographers 20th-century French women writers French biographers French people of Italian-Jewish descent French Resistance members French women historians French women biographers Deaths from intracranial haemorrhage Amedeo Modigliani