Family Histories

The family was by no means an immutable model and evolved throughout the 19th century in line with the era’s political, social and moral disruptions. Regulated by the Civil Code, upheld by the bourgeoisie and impacted by first-wave feminism and romantic shifts in the notion of the couple, it became an ideal observatory for examining the tensions in modern society. Artists, as much actors in as they were witnesses of these changes, provided sometimes idealized sometimes critical and occasionally deeply ambiguous depictions of them.