By From 1850 until the early twentieth century, the great courtesans played a major role in society. They were called “lionesses”. One of the most interesting was Valtesse de la Bigne.
She was the daughter of a washerwoman who made ends meet by prostitution. Louise (as she was then known) followed suit. She aimed much higher than her mother. One of her lovers was the composer Jacques Offenbach. He gave her minor acting roles at the Bouffes-Parisiens. In his company, she dined in all the fashionable Parisian restaurants with the in-crowd, including writers Flaubert, Maupassant and Zola (who based his novel “Nana” on her).
Offenbach was succeeded by a series of princes, all of whom set her up in luxury accommodation and literally spent all their money on her.
The Prince de Sagan built her a magnificent mansion. Valtesse commissioned a bed for the new mansion. It was in the royal style of a “lit de parade”, reflecting the manner kings such as Louis XIV received honoured guests in their bedroom. Instead of having the balustrade to separate the guests from the bed, the designer placed the balustrade around the edge of the bed. As Zola described it in his book, it is more of a throne or an altar.
Having met the artist Corot as a child, she was later the friend and model of artists such as Manet and Gervex. When she died in 1910 she bequeathed her bed to the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris.
