Mania Mavro, Ukraine / France (1889-1969)
An Artist of Light and Character
“You are forging your own path, Mania Mavro. And that is no small thing…”
— Huguette Godin, “Le Mouvement Féministe” Le Quotidien, March 24, 1930
“You are forging your own path, Mania Mavro. And that is no small thing…”
— Huguette Godin, “Le Mouvement Féministe” Le Quotidien, March 24, 1930
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Born in Odesa, then part of the Russian Empire (present-day Ukraine), and later settled in France, Mania Mavro established herself from the early 20th century as a unique figure on the French art scene.
Active at 14 Cité Falguière in 1913 and 1914, she began exhibiting as early as 1911 in several prestigious salons, including the Salon des Indépendants, the Salon des Tuileries, and the Exposition des Amis des Arts. Her powerful style, often described as “masculine,” stood out in an art world still overwhelmingly dominated by men. Far removed from the stereotypes then associated with “feminine painting,” Mania Mavro was noted for being “astonishingly stripped of anything that makes one recognize ‘woman’s painting.’” Her works, like her words, kept their distance from all saccharine or conventional sentimentality. An account from the period depicts her thus: “She climbs in clogs, as autumn yields to winter, through the gorges of the Creuse, to go, despite the frost, and capture the raw beauty of the earth and stream, where rushing waters run.” While the relevance of framing artistic expression in terms of masculinity versus femininity is rightly subject to critique, it is telling that Mavro succeeded in escaping the condescension so often directed at women artists of her time—not only through her choice of subjects, but more importantly through the strength of her execution. In this way, she carved out a place for herself in an art world that was largely resistant to acknowledging women’s artistic legitimacy. |
Mania Mavro
Danseuse bulgare, 1936, watercolour and charcoal on paper Stéphane Piera / Parisienne de Photographie © Mania Mavro / Fonds d'art contemporain - Paris Collections |
Her landscapes of Brittany, the Creuse, Italy, or Corsica are infused with a vivid, almost audible energy, as noted by the critic Gustave Kahn. Her brush captures the movement of water, the dramatic shifts in the sky, the subtle modulations of light. Her emotional response to nature is expressed through a dense, sometimes vehement painterly texture and a formal structure reminiscent of stained glass: bold contours, luminous colours, and a synthesis of volume. Notably, she also worked on designs for stained glass.
Portraits, nudes, figures, and still lifes form essential pillars of her oeuvre. In these works, she demonstrates a rare expressive intensity: bodies and faces, never idealized, are imbued with a sculptural presence and an inner emotional truth. Several critics emphasized her ability to distill forms with striking precision, endowing them with a dynamic force that animates the composition. These qualities are particularly evident in her 1936 watercolor Bulgarian Dancer. Contemporary press often drew comparisons to Cézanne, Gauguin, or even Rodin, while also evoking a certain “Slavic reflection” said to reflect the melancholic soul of Eastern artists. A 1924 article in Le Cri de Paris described her as “frail, slight, mournful,” a stark contrast to the ardent, vigorous, and resolute nature of her painting.
Mania Mavro exhibited in many of Paris’ leading galleries of the time, such as the Galerie Georges Petit, Galerie André, and Galeries Bernheim-Jeune. In 1920, the journal L’Art et les Artistes recognized in this “young Russian artist” a rare vitality and a clear “strength of will.” A decade later, Le Quotidien praised one of her exhibitions as “of the first order,” highlighting the supple yet vehement quality of her work—rich in intensity and expressive force.
She also passed on her knowledge by teaching, notably to one J. Pouce, whose work critics later recognized as being strongly influenced by her instruction. She was married to the illustrator Jean Saurel, known by the pseudonym Jehan Testevuide (“Empty Head”), who died in 1922. Their daughter, Jacqueline Saurel, known as “Linette,” held a degree in philosophy and died prematurely in 1945. The relationship between mother and daughter appears to have been deeply close.
Jean Saurel was the uncle of the famous poet Francis Ponge, making Mavro his aunt. She created a pastel portrait of his parents, Juliette and Armande Ponge. The artist and the writer maintained a correspondence and seemed to share a close bond. In fact, it was she who produced a lithograph of Francis Ponge’s profile for the frontispiece of his 1926 collection Douze petits écrits, published by Gallimard— a commission originally intended for Marc Chagall.
Today, Mania Mavro’s work remains largely overlooked, yet it deserves renewed attention. Strong, intense, and profoundly sincere, her art offers a unique perspective on the world. By restoring her rightful place in the history of modern art, we seek to honor a painter who achieved a measure of success in her lifetime, only to be gradually forgotten.
Edith Varez
Art Historian
Translated from French by Katarina Lupert
For bibliography and French version
© L'AiR Arts and Cité Falguière Associations, 2025
Portraits, nudes, figures, and still lifes form essential pillars of her oeuvre. In these works, she demonstrates a rare expressive intensity: bodies and faces, never idealized, are imbued with a sculptural presence and an inner emotional truth. Several critics emphasized her ability to distill forms with striking precision, endowing them with a dynamic force that animates the composition. These qualities are particularly evident in her 1936 watercolor Bulgarian Dancer. Contemporary press often drew comparisons to Cézanne, Gauguin, or even Rodin, while also evoking a certain “Slavic reflection” said to reflect the melancholic soul of Eastern artists. A 1924 article in Le Cri de Paris described her as “frail, slight, mournful,” a stark contrast to the ardent, vigorous, and resolute nature of her painting.
Mania Mavro exhibited in many of Paris’ leading galleries of the time, such as the Galerie Georges Petit, Galerie André, and Galeries Bernheim-Jeune. In 1920, the journal L’Art et les Artistes recognized in this “young Russian artist” a rare vitality and a clear “strength of will.” A decade later, Le Quotidien praised one of her exhibitions as “of the first order,” highlighting the supple yet vehement quality of her work—rich in intensity and expressive force.
She also passed on her knowledge by teaching, notably to one J. Pouce, whose work critics later recognized as being strongly influenced by her instruction. She was married to the illustrator Jean Saurel, known by the pseudonym Jehan Testevuide (“Empty Head”), who died in 1922. Their daughter, Jacqueline Saurel, known as “Linette,” held a degree in philosophy and died prematurely in 1945. The relationship between mother and daughter appears to have been deeply close.
Jean Saurel was the uncle of the famous poet Francis Ponge, making Mavro his aunt. She created a pastel portrait of his parents, Juliette and Armande Ponge. The artist and the writer maintained a correspondence and seemed to share a close bond. In fact, it was she who produced a lithograph of Francis Ponge’s profile for the frontispiece of his 1926 collection Douze petits écrits, published by Gallimard— a commission originally intended for Marc Chagall.
Today, Mania Mavro’s work remains largely overlooked, yet it deserves renewed attention. Strong, intense, and profoundly sincere, her art offers a unique perspective on the world. By restoring her rightful place in the history of modern art, we seek to honor a painter who achieved a measure of success in her lifetime, only to be gradually forgotten.
Edith Varez
Art Historian
Translated from French by Katarina Lupert
For bibliography and French version
© L'AiR Arts and Cité Falguière Associations, 2025
Mania Mavro is one of more than 30 artists from Cité Falguière whose works are now part of the Fonds d’Art Contemporain - Paris Collections, representing the community's creative continuum from the 19th to the 21st century.
