Unsung art dealer Berthe Weill, the first to sell a Picasso, finally gets her due

Unsung art dealer Berthe Weill, the first to sell a Picasso, finally gets her due

The Fauve artist Raoul Dufy painted 30 Ans ou La Vie en Rose (30 years or In the Pink) to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Galerie B. Weill.

In theory, it’s important to support emerging artists. In practice, those who specialize in such support – a small press, an indie theatre, an early-career commercial art dealer – often find themselves abandoned by the most beautiful butterflies when they burst from the chrysalis. No hard feelings, but an artist will naturally seek the most prominent venue possible.

The early 20th-century Parisian art dealer Berthe Weill seems to have suffered from this reality. To judge from an exhibition at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts devoted to artists she sometimes repre