La Vie Creative

Last week we shared the story of Djuna Barnes and you can’t have Djuna without the story of Natalie Barney,  Natalie was born in October 1876 in Dayton Ohio to a very wealthy family. Raised with an appreciation of art, music, and culture from a very young age they spent weekends in museums and author readings.  One reading while in New York over the summer took a young Natalie and her mother to a...

Franco-American artist and photographer Kali Vermès started making terrariums to satisfy both her green thumb and creative impulses with one activity. The microcosms she creates, under the moniker, Grow Little , are carefully conceived tiny, verdant worlds. Born in Paris, Kali grew up in an apartment filled with hanging plants. Her Russian photographer grandfather grew pear trees and tended a vege...

Djuna Barnes, the woman who mingled with the Lost Generation was born in 1892 in New York and would leave her mark in Paris.  Born into a rather different family, her father had two wives and would later marry Djuna off to his second wife's brother. Shortly after her mother had too much she took her kids and left for New York. There Djuna began working as a writer for the New York Eagle. Not...

BIOGRAPHY International award-winning Artist Stephanie MacKenzie is a vibrant talent. Multiple layers,  brilliant colors, and intricate designs unite through storytelling and blended archetypes bringing lush dimensions to her work.    ABSTRACT ART Immerse yourself into a high saturated universe with Artist Stephanie Mackenzie. Intense color and vivid brushstrokes are created through movement while...

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Amy Kupec Larue has been living, working and traveling in Europe for 30 years. Her passion for flowers, plants and the French Art de Vivre led her to a career that beautifully combines her wide knowledge, keen interests and vast experience with gardens. Since 2005 she has been guiding individuals and groups including the Pacific Horticulture Society, the New York Botanical Garden and the Garden Cl...

Berthe Weill was a French art dealer who played a vital role in the creation of the market for twentieth-century art with the manifestation of the Parisian Avant-Garde. Support the show This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit laviecreativepodcast.substack.com

Sonja Bajic is an illustrator and artist well known for her geographical maps, visual identity, and the search for the best in every day and every process. And illustrating that. Living and working in Paris, Sonja believes in sustainability and a better tomorrow and shows this in her work and through her educational activities. She is the author of several books and projects dealing with the empow...

The list of mistresses of the kings of France is long. For Louis XV, sandwiched between two of the most famous kings might be best known for his many lovers than for the man himself.  After Madame de Pompadour who we have also talked about, Madame du Barry definitely left her mark on Versailles and a very young Marie Antoinette. Jeanne Bécu was born on August 19, 1743, in Vaucouleurs in the northe...

Beowulf Sheehan is a New-York based photographer of figures in the arts and humanities. AUTHOR: The Portraits of Beowulf Sheehan , a collection of portraits of 200 writers from 35 countries with a foreword by Salman Rushdie, was published in 2018. THE AUTHOR PHOTO: Portrait Photographer Beowulf Sheehan on a Life Capturing Writers , a short film by Claire Ince and Ancil McKain, was an official sele...

Born on March 16, 1822 in Bordeaux into a large family of artists. Her mother Sophie Marquis married Raymond Bonheur who was also her drawing teacher. Raymond painted landscapes of Bordeaux and portraits and instilled a love of art in all his children. As a child when Rosa was struggling at school her mother used her love of drawing to her advantage. Asking Rosa to draw an animal for each of the l...

Who is Doni Belau? Who is Doni Belau? An inveterate traveler, I’ve been to nearly 70 countries (and counting). I come alive when I travel, when I’m exploring, and when I’m seeing, tasting, and feeling something new. I love to help other women experience this sensation as I truly feel it helps us see a larger world of possibilities within ourselves. Girls’ Guide to Paris & Beyond is an invitati...

Artist Eva Gonzalez may not be as well known as her fellow female impressionist artists but she should be.  Born on April 19, 1849, in Paris, her father Emmanuell Gonzalez was a Spanish novelist and playwright and her mother was a trained musician. With their creativity handed down to her at a very early age, she was drawn to painting and sketching.  A chance meeting through artists Alfred Stevens...

Marina Khorosh is a writer and copywriter living in New York City. Originally from Russia, she spent her twenties living in New York, after which she moved to Paris to study at Institut Français de la Mode. While in Paris, she launched a blog called Dbag Dating to share her Parisian dating exploits, which soon earned her a role as a writer of a French girl style column for Vogue.com . She was then...

Jeanne Antoinette Poisson was destined to be the mistress of the king. As a child, her mother took her to a fortune-teller who told the young girl that she would one day hold the heart of the king. From then on she was called Reinette, little queen. Her mother set out from that moment to raise her to be a mistress and hired the best teachers to educate her in art, dancing, and the theater. In 1740...

As a fifth-generation Texan, Sumner Hargrove began riding horses bareback at her family’s ranch at the age of three! She went on to do her undergraduate degree magna cum laude at Mary Baldwin College in Virginia in English Literature and Philosophy, followed by a master’s in Public Policy and Public Finance from New York University. She then worked on Wall Street as a municipal bond analyst and pu...

Martha Gelhorn, born in St Louis in 1908 to two parents that wanted much more for their daughter than the role women were to play at the time. Her father George was a doctor and her mother Edna was politically active in the suffrage movement and also served as a president of Bryn Mawr. Her father pulled her out of school as soon as he learned the nuns had covered the pictures of the female anatomy...

Janet Skeslien Charles grew up on the plains of Montana. She spent two years in Odessa, Ukraine, as a Soros Teaching Fellow. She has taught English, French, and Creative writing in Ukraine, Montana, and France. She enjoys reading, spending time with family, and researching her new novel.  The backdrop of her debut novel MOONLIGHT IN ODESSA is the booming business of email-order brides, an industry...

Anne de Rochechouart de Montemart may not jump to your mind but her great grandmother does. While you would think the great-granddaughter of Veuve Clicquot would sit back sipping her family champagne and counting all her money, that wasn’t the life that Anne wanted.  The apple of her great grandmother's eye, they would remain close her entire life and would also inherit the bulk of her estate...

At Adrienne’s 10th birthday, every guest went home with a ruby ball cactus as their party favor. Although Adrienne preferred otherwise, it was inevitable. Every year party guests left her birthday with plants in their arms. It was because both of her parents worked in the horticulture industry in San Diego, California.  Born on Valentine’s Day, Adrienne literally grew up in the flowers. Her days w...

George Sand, the woman that marched to her own beat, broke with tradition, and carved out her own life is this week's featured lady on La Vie Creative - Paris History Avec a Hemingway.  Born in Paris on July 1, 1804, Amantine Lucille Aurore Dupin as she was known long before she went by George. As many of these stories go, her mother was a prostitute and her father only married her in the fin...

Daughter of renowned Swiss abstract painter Gérard Schneider, she has continued the family tradition of painting. She paints from a country setting near Fontainebleau. She has become highly acclaimed for her acrylic floral work. Her work portrays the soft illusion of forms blowing in a gentle breeze. http://laurence-amelie.com/WP/ Support the show This is a public episode. If you would like to dis...

If there was one story I was excited to share when we began this podcast it was the life of Valtesse de La Bigne. Born in 1848 she learned from a very early age she had to take care of herself. Her father was an alcoholic who wouldn’t have a role in her life and her mother was a laundress and prostitute. At ten years old she worked in a candy store and within a few years, she was working twelve-ho...

Edith de Belleville is a licensed tour guide in Paris and an attorney at law. She wrote a book about inspirational Parisian women from the past "Belles et  Rebelles".She also teaches the Jewish heritage in Paris at university  Gustave Eiffel for the future licensed tour guides. Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/694562301015164/?ref=share Website: www.edithdebelleville.com Support...

When the Impressionist artists ruled Paris, there were a few women that made their way into the exclusive club. Known as Les Trois Grandes Dames, Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt, and Marie Bracquemond mixed and mingled with the likes of Manet, Degas, and Renoir.  Marie Bracquemond however had a very different life than Morisot or Cassatt. Raised in a family that had very little money but with a love...