Mildred Bendall French , 1891-1977

 

Born in Bordeaux, Bendall was the youngest of three children of English merchant Manley Forbes Bendall and Marie-Blanche-Elisabeth Chrisman. Between 1910 and 1914 she studied under the painter Félix Carme, whose refined approach to composition and drawing influenced her early work. Her talent was recognised at an early stage when her painting Coin de Salon Bordelais received first prize at the Peinture au Palmarès de l’Union Féminine de Bordeaux in 1914, and was later acquired by the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux in 1919.

 

Her early paintings reveal the influence of Carme’s classical style, combined with a growing confidence in colour, structure and composition. These qualities later brought her the admiration of artists such as Henri Matisse and Albert Marquet. In 1920 she was accepted into the Salon des Artistes Français in Paris, and by 1927 she had made the city her permanent home.

 

Bendall’s artistic development was greatly shaped by her time at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Montparnasse, a centre of creative exchange for the artists of the École de Paris. Her friendship with Matisse proved particularly significant, encouraging her exploration of Fauvist principles, with colour becoming an essential element in creating form and atmosphere. Her connection with the Matisse family was also a close personal one; Henri Matisse’s son Jean-Gérard proposed marriage to her.

 

A passionate advocate for the arts in Bordeaux, Bendall played an important role in strengthening links between artists in the region and the Parisian avant-garde. In 1928 she helped establish the Artistes Indépendants Bordelais, a group founded in opposition to academic traditions, and encouraged major artists including Bonnard, Braque, Utrillo, Matisse and Picasso to exhibit alongside them. The following year she became a founding member of Le Studio, an independent artistic academy that introduced life-drawing classes to Bordeaux.

 

In 1937, Bendall’s work was included in the exhibition Jeune France at the Galerie de Paris, alongside artists including Kees van Dongen, Max Jacob and Raoul Dufy. The Musée National d’Art Moderne in Paris acquired her painting Bouquet à la table ronde from this exhibition.

 

After the Second World War, Bendall continued to develop her distinctive style, characterised by expressive colour, confident composition and a deep appreciation of nature. Combining elements of Fauvism and Expressionism, her paintings possess a distinctive warmth and vitality. Her contribution to modern French painting was recognised with a retrospective exhibition in 1951, followed by a further acquisition by the Musée d’Art Moderne in 1954.

 

Mildred Bendall continued to paint until her death in 1977, leaving behind a body of work celebrated for its lyrical use of colour, elegance of design and modern interpretation of the world around her.

 

 

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