A pupil of the Académie Colarossi, she painted — but her legend buried her work. The day after Modigliani's death, on 25 January 1920, she threw herself from the fifth floor, at twenty-one, eight months pregnant. It took ten years for her to join him.
The story
Jeanne Hébuterne was born at Meaux on 6 April 1898. A pupil at the Académie Colarossi, she painted — and her work was long buried under her legend.
She met Amedeo Modigliani at La Rotonde in March 1917 and moved in with him in the rue de la Grande-Chaumière, against the will of her father, an austere Catholic who saw in him a depraved Jewish painter. Their daughter was born at Nice on 29 November 1918.
Modigliani died of tubercular meningitis on 24 January 1920. Jeanne's parents refused to let her go and pay her respects to the body.
The next day she threw herself from the fifth-floor window of her parents' flat at 8 bis rue Amyot. She was twenty-one and eight months pregnant.
Her family had her buried at the cemetery of Bagneux. It took ten years — and the insistence of Modigliani's brother — for her to be moved to Père-Lachaise, in 1930, and to lie with him at last. The Italian epitaph calls her a companion devoted to the last sacrifice.
The grave
The grave is Modigliani's, and both inscriptions are in Italian. The painter's says that death seized him “as he reached glory” — morte lo colse, quando giunse alla gloria. Jeanne's, engraved beneath, defines her entirely through him: “Jeanne Hébuterne, born in Paris on 6 April 1898, died in Paris on 25 January 1920, devoted companion of Amédeo Modigliani unto the extreme sacrifice”. The stone is wrong: she was born at Meaux. The word “sacrifice” is the only clue to what happened, and nothing says that she painted. She has only been there since 1930.
On site, do not miss
The two Italian inscriptions that answer each other: glory attained for him, the extreme sacrifice for her.
Visitors' questions
Where is Jeanne Hébuterne's grave?
In Division 96, Avenue Transversale No. 1, fourth row — in the grave of Amedeo Modigliani, to which she was moved in 1930. The inscription is entirely in Italian.
Amedeo ModiglianiHow did she die?
She threw herself from the fifth-floor window of her parents' flat at 8 bis rue Amyot, on 25 January 1920 — the day after Modigliani's death. She was twenty-one and eight months pregnant.
Gerda TaroWhy did it take ten years to move her?
Because her family, hostile to Modigliani, had buried her in the Bagneux cemetery. It took the insistence of the painter's brother to have her moved to Père-Lachaise, in 1930.
Marie LaurencinWhat does the inscription on her grave say?
It is in Italian and calls her “devoted companion unto the ultimate sacrifice” — “compagna devota fino all'estremo sacrifizio”. Modigliani's own says that death took him “just as he was reaching glory”.
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