Françoise Gilot: Strong Woman

by Linda Harris Sittig

I don’t usually profile a Strong Woman so soon after she has passed, but I am making an exception this month.

French artist Françoise Gilot died recently at 101, having led an extraordinary life. She became an accomplished painter and sculptor over her father’s vehement objections and wrote an internationally bestselling memoir about her years as Pablo Picasso’s mistress and muse.

Françoise was born in November 1921 and showed an early interest in art when most other children started school. Her strict father was determined she would become an exemplary student and had her tutored at home starting at age six, learning the fundamentals of Greek mythology. Her mother, a watercolor artist in her own right, countered by teaching Françoise art lessons.

By the time Françoise was a teenager, she was spending her free time visiting various art museums where she would study the paintings of the masters. Her father determined that she would become a lawyer and allowed her to matriculate with a degree from the Sorbonne in Paris, but then enrolled her in law school against her wishes.

Françoise spent a year in law school and dropped out to study art. Infuriated, her father forced her to enroll for a second year, and only after she failed her law exams did she gain the freedom to pursue her love of art.

Living in Paris, exhibiting her paintings and sculpting, she met Pablo Picasso one night in a restaurant. She was 21, and he was 61. I cannot say it was love at first sight, but Picasso became infatuated with her, and his strong magnetic personality and fame in the art world most undoubtedly attracted her.

She ended up living with him for ten years, giving him two children (Claude and Paloma) while he continued his artistic career of painting, making ceramics, and writing poetry.

And then, Françoise did the unthinkable; she left Picasso in 1953. Neither his first wife nor any previous mistresses had accomplished that. He was so enraged that he destroyed all her possessions in their shared home and attempted to sabotage her career by asking the galleries in Paris to refuse to exhibit her work.

But she kept painting.

In 1955 Françoise married fellow artist Luc Simon; however, the marriage was not destined to last. Picasso came to Françoise and told her that if she divorced Simon and remarried him, their children (Claude and Paloma) would become Picasso’s legitimate heirs.

Françoise went ahead with the divorce, only to learn that Picasso had recently married a second wife and had no intentions of making Françoise’s children his legitimate heirs.

So, in 1964, Françoise penned her memoir Life with Picasso, which sold over one million copies. Picasso did everything he could to stop its publication but to no avail. After the book’s publication, he abruptly stopped communicating with their children. Meanwhile, Françoise used the proceeds from the sales to mount a legal case for Claude and Paloma to claim legitimacy.

In 1969 while on a trip to California, Françoise met Jonas Salk, the medical pioneer of the polio vaccine. The two married in 1970 and continued to split their life between France and America until he died in 1995. While in America, Françoise exhibited her paintings at the Museum of Modern Art and designed costumes, stage sets, and masks for the Guggenheim Museum. She also taught art classes at the University of Southern California.

When Picasso died in 1973, his estate was worth the modern equivalent of 1.3 billion dollars. But it would not be until 1975 that Françoise’s longtime efforts came to fruition. In addition to the grandchildren of his one legitimate child, Paola, the grandchildren of his three children born out of wedlock became recognized by the courts as having a rightful claim to an inheritance.

And those heirs helped to establish Musée de Picasso in Paris, France.

Françoise continued to paint throughout her lifetime. In 2021 one of her paintings, Paloma à la Guitare, sold for 1.3 million at a Sotheby auction.

She may have started in Picasso’s shadow, but she emerged in the brilliant light of her own success.

Thank you to Susan Ewing of California who suggested I learn about Francoise.

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I am busy right now marketing my newest book, OPENING CLOSED DOORS: THE STORY OF JOSIE C. MURRAY. It is the extraordinary story of a young African-American woman who back in 1957 forced the issue of segregation for the public libraries of Virginia. Written for 4th/5th grades, it is my hope to get it into every elementary library so the children of today will learn about the struggles we have gone through in America to ensure equality for all. It is available from bookstores and online. Here is the link to buy it from my website: https://www.lindasittig.com.

~ linda