Delaunay-Terk, Sonia

Delaunay-Terk, Sonia (1885–1979). Russian painter, graphic artist, and designer, active in Paris, the wife of Robert Delaunay. Her original surname was Stern, but she adopted the name Terk from a wealthy uncle who brought her up in St Petersburg. Max Liebermann was a friend of the family and encouraged her to paint. She settled in Paris in 1905, married Delaunay in 1910 (after a short-lived marriage of convenience to Wilhelm Uhde), and became associated with him in the development of Orphism. During the 1920s she worked mainly as a designer of hand-printed fabrics and tapestries; she made a strong impact on the world of international fashion, designing creations for such famous women as Nancy Cunard and Gloria Swanson. The Depression affected her business, however, and in the 1930s she returned primarily to painting and became a member of the Abstraction-Création association. After the death of her husband in 1941 she continued to work as a painter and designer. In 1963 she gave 58 of her own works and 40 of her husband's to the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Paris; they were exhibited at the Louvre the following year and she thus became the first woman to be exhibited at the Louvre during her lifetime.