GABRIËLE

A remarkable champion of the avant-garde, unremembered by history, is rescued from obscurity by her great-granddaughters, a pair of writing sisters.

Wife of Francis Picabia, mistress of Marcel Duchamp and, later, Igor Stravinsky, close friend of Guillaume Apollinaire and many other notables, Gabriële Buffet-Picabia (who died in 1985 at age 104) was an unknown figure to her great-granddaughters, French novelists Anne—bestselling author of The Postcard—and Claire. Why was this memorable woman lost to both her family and the world? The Berests set out to explain the mystery in a curious biographical novel which traces some of Gabriële’s story, drawing on archives, interviews, and historical works. A student of music, first in Paris and then Berlin, Gabriële took no interest in men until, in 1908, her brother introduced her to Picabia, already a star of the art world. It’s a meeting of minds, “conjoined intellects,” and Gabriële inspires the artist to discard Impressionism and paint differently, in a style reminiscent of music. They marry and have four children, Picabia remaining “a flamboyant hotshot”: impulsive, promiscuous, socially voracious, nervously unstable. The novel becomes an account of this union, the art movements (Cubism, Dadaism) Picabia and his friends explore, and of a colorful, creative circle. The couple forms a very close friendship with younger artist Duchamp, who falls in love with Gabriële and folds her into his work. Similarly, writer and critic Apollinaire becomes an intimate, as do others, both in Europe and the U.S. The artistic ferment is interrupted by World War I, by which time the marriage is becoming strained. And there are glimpses of the future: Gabriële’s decline, and an explanation of the family mystery. Throughout, the authors emphasize Gabriële’s intellect, but also her preference—unlike her husband’s—for “remain[ing] in shadow.” This flavors the book, too, which extols but doesn’t fully animate her.

An atmospheric excavation of an unusual woman and marriage, both intriguing and remote.