Elizabeth Jane Gardner (1837-1922) was an American artist who lived in Paris from 1864-1922. She was the most frequently represented woman artist of any nationality at the Paris Salon in the late nineteenth century, and the only American woman to have ever won a medal (1887). In 1896, she married William Bouguereau, the major academic painter of the time. Yet in spite of these distinctions, Elizabeth Gardner has received surprisingly little scholarly attention. / This thesis is a biographical and analytical study of the expatriate artist, based on her unpublished letters in the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. Though the focus is primarily on her years as a practicing artist in Paris (1864 to 1896), attention is also given to her early and late years, and to the collaborative nature of her relationship with Bouguereau. / A chronology of the artist, as well as inventories of her paintings and letters are also included.

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