Henriette Ronnerartist • painter • watercolourist • draughtsman • printmakerAmsterdam 1821-1909 Brussel

Henriette Ronner-Knip has gone down in history as the cat painter par excellence. Her paintings of cats remain well-known and beloved by the general public, because she managed to capture her felines strikingly on canvas with their characteristic poses, the texture and colours of their fur, and their ‘mysterious cat gaze’.

Henriette was born in Amsterdam in 1821 as the second child of the Brabant painter Josephus Augustus Knip and the Amsterdam native Cornelia van Leeuwen. She had one brother: August (1819-1861). Henriette and her brother were the third generation of artists in the family. Shortly after her birth, Knip moved with her parents to Den Bosch and subsequently to Paris, after which the family returned to the Netherlands (Vught) in 1827. By then, her father had become blind in one eye.

For a long time in the 19th century, the only path open to women with artistic talent was through family. Consequently, Henriette learned the trade from her father, who painted livestock, stable interiors, and landscapes. At the age of four, Henriette was given a permanent spot in her father's studio, and on her eleventh birthday, he gave her an easel as a gift. Following in her father's footsteps, she painted landscapes with livestock and was interested in depicting all kinds of small animals such as hares, pigeons, dogs, and cats. Around 1870, she began painting cats, a subject for which she is still known today. Despite the fact that her father had become blind in one eye, he provided, with iron discipline, the artistic education of his daughter and that of her brother. In 1902, contemporary Johan Gram wrote the following about her childhood in a book published in honor of her seventieth birthday: ‘From very early in the morning until darkness fell she sat faithfully working, whether in the studio; she was granted no respite from work other than mealtimes, which she had to spend in a pitch-dark room, because her father hoped thereby to strengthen her eyesight and protect her from the misfortune that had befallen him.

In 1833, after a short stay in The Hague, the Knip family moved back to Brabant, this time to Berlicum. Gradually, Henriette took on the care of the household and, even as a young girl, contributed to the family income through the sale of her paintings. From 1838 onwards, she sold work at the annual Exhibitions of Living Masters organized in various Dutch cities: North Brabant landscapes with cattle, village markets, stable interiors, scenes with domestic animals, livestock, pigeons, hunting dogs, and monkeys, all in a romantic style.

After the death of her parents, Henriette moved to Amsterdam in 1848 at the age of 27. Here she became the first female member of the artists' society Artis et Amicitiae. Two years later, she married Feico Ronner, whom she had already met in Berlicum. Immediately after the marriage, the couple settled in Ixelles near Brussels. From then on, she called herself Ronner or Ronner-Knip. She came under the influence of the Belgian realist dog painter Joseph Stevens (1816-1892) and was fascinated by draft dogs, placing her among the first generation of realist artists who found their inspiration in animal life.

Ronner-Knip gained considerable fame with her dog paintings. Her fame was so great that the Queen of Belgium and her sister-in-law had their lapdogs immortalized by her. However, she would only definitively establish her name with the long-haired cats she began painting and watercoloring starting in 1870. The fact that cats suddenly attracted so much attention is believed to be largely due to the first purebred cat show, which was held in London's Crystal Palace in 1871. Henriette Ronner-Knip was able to accurately depict the fur, posture, and expression of these animals. The anecdotal element she often added also made her work popular. Because cats were becoming increasingly common as pets in the salons of the affluent bourgeoisie, this proved to be a gap in the market. Ronner-Knip placed her cats in luxuriously furnished living rooms recognizable to the well-to-do public. She gave her paintings titles such as ‘Playing Instruments’, ‘Music Lesson’, or ‘Journey Around the World’, which gave her artworks a human and comical quality at the same time. She had a unique and distinctive way of working. In the garden behind her house was the ‘foyer des artistes’, where loan cats always stayed. In her studio, a special cat furniture piece was used—a kind of glass Louis XV cabinet—in which she could observe both the animals she wanted to sketch in peace and quiet, as well as the young kittens that would otherwise scatter in all directions.

Henriette Knip had five children with Feico Ronner, three of whom would become painters. Feico was in poor health and had no profession; Henriette was the breadwinner of the family. Her husband helped out in business.

She was well-versed in the business side of being an artist. This was a full-time job, as Henriette participated in many exhibitions both at home and abroad. That she was very successful is also evident from the many silver and gold medals she received for her work. In 1887 she was made a Knight of the Belgian Order of Leopold, and in 1901 a Knight of the Order of Orange-Nassau. The prices she charged for her work rose rapidly over the course of her career: from two hundred guilders in the 1840s to more than two thousand guilders in the 1880s, a price at the time that only the most famous painters could command.

After the death of her husband in 1883, Henriette Ronner-Knip continued to live and work in Elsene. Under the influence of Impressionism, her compositions became simpler towards the end of her career: she focused more on the cats than on their surroundings and painted in lighter colours. Until a ripe old age, she still painted – tirelessly – her cats for 4 to 5 hours every day.

After her death in 1909, obituaries appeared in various newspapers and magazines. For instance, 'De Wereldkroniek' wrote: ‘With Henriette Ronner-Knip, a very important figure from the Dutch painting world has passed away, a woman whose memory will continue to live on in her work for centuries to come throughout the world.’