6 Muses Who Became Famous Artists’ Companions Alongside Their Wives

Artists are passionate and tend to surrender to their feelings and emotions completely. Some of them even have a heart so big that they can love a few people simultaneously. We decided to find out which famous painters, sculptors, and photographers couldn’t limit their inspiration to just one woman.

Fanny Cornforth

Cornforth met Dante Gabriel Rossetti in 1856. She became his model and lover. They kept their relationship a secret from the artist’s wife, Elizabeth Siddal. Many biographers speculated that Siddal disliked Cornforth, but there is no evidence that the woman was even aware of her existence.

After Siddal’s death in 1862, Cornforth moved into Rossetti’s house as his housekeeper. The woman belonged to the rural working class and had a coarse accent with no education. All of this shocked Rossetti’s family. His brother praised the girl’s beauty but pointed out her low intellect. Some of the artist’s friends never accepted Cornforth and pressured him to end the affair.

During her relationship with Rossetti, Cornforth gained weight. This became the reason for their inside jokes. He affectionately referred to her as “my dear elephant,” and she called him “Rhino.” When they were apart, the artist drew cartoons of elephants and sent them to her, often signing them “Old Rhinoceros.”

After Rossetti’s health seriously deteriorated, his family forced Cornforth to leave the house. The artist paid for her accommodations nearby, saying, “You are the only person whom it is my duty to provide for, and you may be sure I should do my utmost as long as there was a breath in my body or a penny in my purse.” Rossetti also gave her several of his paintings, making sure her legal ownership was documented.

Camille Claudel

Claudel began working in the studio of Auguste Rodin in 1883. She was his model and lover. But the couple didn’t live together, as the sculptor didn’t want to end his 20-year relationship with Rose Beuret.

Claudel’s family, especially her mother, was very unhappy about this affair, and she never approved of the fact that her daughter decided to become an artist. Because of this, Claudel was forced to leave the family home.

In 1892, after the termination of a pregnancy, Claudel ceased to be Rodin’s mistress. Even so, they would continue to meet regularly until 1898.

Marie-Thérèse Walter

In 1927, a man approached Walter in the street and said, “You have an interesting face. I would like to do a portrait of you. I am Picasso.” From then on, Walter began to pose for him, and they began a relationship. At that time, the artist was married to Olga Khokhlova, and they had a 5-year-old son.

In 1934, Walter got pregnant. When a friend informed Khokhlova that her husband had a longtime relationship with a woman who was expecting a child from him, she immediately left Picasso with their son, Paulo. In September 1935, Walter gave birth to a daughter, Maya.

By the time of Maya’s birth, Picasso had already been seeing several other women. The relationship between Walter and the artist ended in 1940. However, they continued to meet from time to time. In 1955, when Khokhlova died, Picasso called Walter and asked her to marry him. She refused. Picasso never saw her again.

Lydia Delectorskaya

In 1932, Deleсtorskaya took a job as a maid and secretary in the house of Henri Matisse. It was 3 years before the artist asked her to pose for him. At this time, Deleсtorskaya was 25, and Matisse was 65.

Their cooperation was coherent and successful. The young woman ran the artist’s studio, selected models, and dealt with dealers, sellers, and galleries. Everything ran like clockwork.

Their close working partnership resulted in Matisse’s wife of 40 years drawing an ultimatum, stating, “It’s her or me!” The artist chose his wife, but she left him anyway in 1939. That’s when he asked Deleсtorskaya to come back to help him with the studio. They stayed together for the rest of his life.

Dorothy Norman

Dorothy Norman met Alfred Stieglitz in 1927. At the time, he was already a successful photographer and was well respected.

Norman and Stieglitz were both married — she was married to Edward A. Norman, the son of an entrepreneur, and Stieglitz was married to artist Georgia O’Keeffe. Despite this, they began a long-term romance. It started when Norman became Stieglitz’s student.

Their relationship lasted until his death in 1946. Dorothy Norman’s marriage to Edward A. Norman ended in divorce in 1951.

Helga Testorf

In 1986, Andrew Wyeth announced that for the past 15 years, he had made 240 drawings and paintings of a woman named Helga Testorf. The paintings were extraordinary yet subtle. He had not previously told anyone about his work with this model, not even his wife.

Testorf was, for a time, the nurse of a farmer who lived near the Wyeths’ home. Neither the artist nor his muse made their relationship public. His wife, Betsy Wyeth, later spoke about the paintings in several interviews, saying that Testorf’s images served as the basis and inspiration for Wyeth’s other works.

When asked about a possible affair between her husband and his muse, Betsy Wyeth ironically remarked that she had doubts about it because if they crossed over into that territory, Wyeth would have lost the magic in the paintings.

And here’s the story of a kitchen maid who became Christian Dior’s muse. Check it out!