All Our Cousins

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Virginia Oldoini, Countess of Castiglione (22 March 1837 – 28 November 1899), better known as La Castiglione, was an Italian aristocrat who achieved notoriety as a mistress of Emperor Napoleon III of France. She was also a significant figure in the early history of photography.

Born Virginia Elisabetta Luisa Carlotta Antonietta Teresa Maria Oldoïni, (French: Virginie Élisabeth Louise Charlotte Antoinette Thérèse Marie Oldoïni) in Florence, Tuscany to Marquis Filippo Oldoini and Marquise Isabella Lamporecchi, members of the minor Tuscan nobility, she was often known by her nickname of "Nicchia". 

She married Francesco Verasis, conte di Castiglione, at the age of 17. He was twelve years her senior. They had a son, Giorgio.

Her cousin, Camillo, conte di Cavour, was a minister to Victor Emmanuel II, king of Sardinia(that included Piedmont and Savoy). When the Count and Countess traveled to Paris in 1855, the Countess was under her cousin's instructions to plead the cause of Italian unity with Napoleon III of France. 

She achieved notoriety by becoming Napoleon III's mistress, a scandal that led her husband to demand a marital separation. 

During her relationship with the French emperor in 1856 and 1857, she entered the social circle of European royalty. She met Augusta of Saxe-Weimar, Otto von Bismarck and Adolphe Thiers, among others.

The Countess was known for her beauty and her flamboyant entrances in elaborate dress at the imperial court. One of her most infamous outfits was a "Queen of Hearts" costume. George Frederic Watts painted her portrait in 1857. 

She was described as having long, wavy blonde hair, pale skin, a delicate oval face, and eyes that constantly changed colour from green to an extraordinary blue-violet.

The Countess returned to Italy in 1857 when her affair with Napoleon III was over. Four years later, the Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed, conceivably in part due to the influence that the Countess had exerted on Napoleon III. That same year, she returned to France and settled in Passy.

In 1856 she began sitting for Mayer and Pierson, photographers favored by the imperial court.  Over the next four decades she directed Pierre-Louis Pierson to help her create 700 different photographs in which she re-created the signature moments of her life for the camera. She spent a large part of her personal fortune and even went into debt to execute this project. Most of the photographs depict the Countess in her theatrical outfits, such as the Queen of Hearts dress. 

A number of photographs depict her in poses risqué for the era—notably, images that expose her bare legs and feet. 

Virginia spent her declining years in an apartment in the Place Vendôme, where she had the rooms decorated in funereal black, the blinds kept drawn, and mirrors banished—apparently so she would not have to confront her advancing age and loss of beauty. She would only leave the apartment at night. 

In November 28, 1899, she died at age sixty-two, and was buried at the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.

Robert de Montesquiou, a Symbolist poet, dandy, and avid art collector, was fascinated by the Countess di Castiglione. He spent thirteen years writing a biography, La Divine Comtesse, which appeared in 1913. After her death, he collected 433 of her photographs, all of which entered the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

A Goddess of Self-Love Who Did Not Sit Quietly

By SARAH BOXERPublished: October 13, 2000

The countess had herself photographed as a frowning nun, as Medea with a knife, as the tragic heroine Beatrix, as Judith entering the tent of Holofernes, as a drowned virgin, as Lady Macbeth sleepwalking, as a courtesan flaunting her legs, as Anne Boleyn, as Goya's ''Maja,'' as a nurse to her dying dog and as a corpse in a coffin.

She used mirrors to fragment and multiply images. And she had an obsession with eyes and detached body parts.

''She would appear at gatherings like a goddess descended from the clouds,'' a contemporary noted, and she would ''allow people to admire her as if she were a shrine.'' The Princess Metternich oohed about her: ''Wonderful hair, the waist of a nymph, and a complexion the color of pink marble! In a word, Venus descended from Olympus!'' But, the princess added, ''after a few moments she began to get on your nerves.''

Her vanity was as famous as her beauty. She sent albums of her portraits to friends and admirers. She would not speak to women. She was endlessly enraptured with herself and assumed that others were as well.

In ''The Eyes,'' she holds a pocket mirror away from her face so that her eye is the only thing showing in it. Then she fixes this eye on the photographer. In ''The Opera Ball,'' all you can see is her back. She appears to be diving headfirst into a full-length mirror while a tiny pocket mirror watches from a chair.

When the countess's husband tried to take their son away from her, she responded by sending him a Medea-like portrait of herself titled ''Vengeance.'' She has a murderous look. She has a knife dripping with blood painted into her hand. Apparently, she made her point; she kept Giorgio.