Joséphine Fodor-Mainvielle

When this portrait became part of the Tansey Collection, it had the title “Maria Fedor”¹; the latest research, however, has identified the sitter as Joséphine Fodor-Mainvielle (1793-1870), daughter of the famous Hungarian violinist and composer Joseph Fodor. She received her first musical training from her father and was soon a successful singer at the Imperial Opera. Her marriage to the actor Mainvielle made her a French citizen. After periods in Stockholm and Copenhagen, the couple moved to Paris where the singer worked without great success. After several performances in the Fenice in Venice she returned to Paris and finally achieved a breakthrough at the Théâtre Italien with a voice that was said to have an irresistible softness. Due to health problems Fodor-Mainvielle travelled to Naples in 1822, where she obtained contracts with the opera house. Her successes in Naples and Vienna encouraged her to attempt a comeback in Paris in 1825, but her voice had altered and this led to an embarrassing failure. Despite another period spent in Naples her voice did not recover its former quality. She abandoned her singing career in 1833. In 1857 she wrote a book on singing.²
Singry painted Fodor-Mainvielle during her most successful years in Paris(between 1819 and 1822) and exhibited the portrait in the Paris Salon in 1822.³ It shows the singer as a self-confident personality full of life and energy.
B. P.