Cléo de Mérode
(Cléopatra-Diane de Mérode)
* September 27th 1875, Paris (France)
† October 17th 1966, Paris (France)
The Belgian ballerina, dancer and actress Cléo de Mérode was the beauty queen of Europe's Belle Epoque. Numerous portraits by Reutlinger and Nadar document her exceptional beauty and elegance. She was also portrayed by painters like Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Giovanni Boldini and Georges Jules Victor Clairin. Her typical hair-styling was adopted
Cléo de Mérode started her education in ballet at the Paris opera at age seven and had her first performances on stage at age eleven. After being a successful dancer at the ballet, she extended her performances also at the variety, i.e. the Folies Bergère.
One of Cléo de Mérode's most famous performances was her exotic dance creation "La Cambodgienne", which she showed at the Paris World Fair in 1900 at the Théâtre Indochinois. She performed dancing until her early fifties and had international engagements i.e. in New York, Berlin, Munich and Bordeaux.
There was a lot of speculation about her affairs with high society men and royals, especially a liaison with the Belgian King Léopold II. Cléo de Mérode by herself always denied being a so called "Cocotte", like her contemporaries Liane de Pougy, Emilienne d'Alençon or La Belle Otéro.
In 1896 Alexandre Falguière caused a scandal with his nude sculpture called "La Danseuse" for the Salon des Champs-Elysées. It was assumed that Cléo de Mérode was acting as a model for the artist.
After retiring from stage Cléo de Mérode lived in an appartment at Biarritz and published her autobiography "Le ballet de ma vie" in 1955.
Cléo de Mérode died at age 91 at Paris and was buried at Père Lachaise cemetery, Paris.
Bibliography:
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de Mérode, Cléo
Le ballet de ma vie
Horay, 1955
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Ripa, Yannick
Cléo de Mérode: Icône de la belle époque
Tallandier, 2022
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Websites:
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Cléo de Mérode
by Giovanni Boldini (1842-1931)
"La Danseuse" (Paris Salon, 1896)
by Alexandre Falguière (1831 - 1900)
Musée d'Orsay
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