Lucy Krohg


Lucy Krohg was a French model.

Life

Born in Paris, she was the daughter of baker François Victor Vidil and Cécile Vidil, who used the name Lucy. From an early age, she was a member of the circle of artists gathered around Montparnasse and Montmartre; she was a model for Henri Matisse and Albert Marquet. In 1909, she met Jules Pascin, with whom she had a long-standing affair. She posed for him in many paintings. Despite close relations, Pascin left Paris in 1914 with his fiancée Hermine David, and married her in 1918. The abandoned Lucy Vidil continued to pose for the painters and stayed with the Parisian bohemia. During one of the evenings in Le Dôme Café, she met the Norwegian painter Per Krohg. Krohg was known not only for his artistic work, she completed several dance courses and was a dance floor master. The couple were married on 21 December 1915, and in 1917 Lucy gave birth to a son, Guy. Pascin returned to Paris in the autumn of 1920 and renewed his romance with his former lover in the spring of 1921. In the summer of 1921, Per Krohg left for Norway for a painting plein-air workshop,and Pascin and Hermine David's relationship ended in separation. Lucy wanted to save her marriage, but was emotionally addicted to her lover, who had become dependent on alcohol and threatened to commit suicide. Lucy led a double life, spent the day looking after her son and moving to Pascin for the night. This situation lasted for three years. In 1924, Krohg took his son away. In 1927 Pascin was threatened with the loss of American citizenship and was forced to live in New York for at least one year. Five months after his departure, Krohg joined him. Together, they returned to Europe and travelled to Spain and Portugal, and then found themselves in Paris. Pascin already suffered from depression and was an alcoholic. On 5 June 1930, when his own solo exhibition was to be opened, he committed suicide in his studio. First, he cut his wrists and wrote Adieu Lucy on the wall with blood and then he hanged himself. The body was discovered three days later by Krohg. After the opening of his will, it was discovered that that Pascin had shared his estate between his wife, Hermine David, and Lucy. Lucy's marriage had not really existed for many years, the official divorce from Pierre Krohg only taking place in 1934, when he wished to marry another woman. In later years, Krohg's name appeared periodically while exhibiting Pascin's works, as half of the collection remained in her possession and she established her own gallery based on it.
Lucy Krohg died in Paris at the age of 86.