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The exhibition evokes the emblematic roles of her large repertoire from Phèdre to La Tosca, not forgetting her famous Dame aux camélias. But the indefatigable Sarah was not content to rule everything in the theater from the sets to the costumes, from the stagehands to the extras, between three fits of anger and two fainting spells, she was an accomplished artist on the boards and in the city.
Her life was a vast and endless representation, she wrote, directed, played and still found the energy to paint and sculpt.
The Sarah Bernhardt myth was built by Nadar, Georges Clairin, Louise Abbéma, Alfons Mucha and so many others.
But behind the envelope offered to the eyes of the crowd of its admirers, the exhibition reveals an extraordinary being with the most assertive character who, all her life, refused the very idea of limits.
Jules Bastien-Lepage, Portrait of Sarah Bernhardt 1879, Private collection
Christies’s images /Bridgeman Images