Édouard Vuillard is basically a soap opera character. A Mama's boy whose affairs left no time for marriage. Jews saved him from the Nazis.

Édouard came onto the art scene with an enviable pedigree. He studied at the École des Beaux-Arts and moved on to a lifelong career as a portraitist and constantly commissioned painter. He joined the short-lived group of artists who called themselves Nabis, which means 'prophet' in Hebrew. The Nabis took a cue from Paul Gauguin and Edgar Degas and were entranced by color. Most of the Nabis struck out on painting to the point that the group self-imploded within a few years. Vuillard was one of the few founding members to have any kind of painting career after they broke up. 

Mama Vuillard was his roommate until her death in 1928, when he was 60 years old. She had a home business as a corset maker and many of Édouard's portraits are of her sweeping up the house or, more creepily, plying her trade. Again, just painting Mom making a corset. Mama was very supportive of her son's career, going so far as to develop the photographs he took of people and landscapes to aide his memory while sprucing up a work before delivery...

...Which is really gross considering a good chunk of those photographs were of the women he was either trying to have an affair with or having an affair with. Vuillard's first attempt at being a homewrecker was with Misia Natanson, socialite and wife to publisher and banking heir Thadée Natanson. Vuillard was one of many artists Thadée's arts magazine La Revue Blanche promoted. Though Édouard and Misia probably never actually got down to business, he tried for years until La Revue went belly-up and he needed to find another way to get those sweet, sweet painting commissions.

In comes Jos Hessel, one of Edouard's most supportive art dealers. Jos dealt in the cream-of-the-crop in the French at scene, putting Vuillard in the same league as Matisse and Renoir. Lucy, Jos's wife, was Edouard's constant model, supporter, and lover for nearly 40 years. Jos knew about the funny business and just didn't care, as many marriages in turn-of-the-century France were served up Clinton-style. 

Many of Vuillard's repeat patrons were Jewish, including the Natansons and Hessels. This wouldn't necessarily be something to highlight, except for his being in Paris when the Nazis invaded and began their years-long occupation in 1940. The Hessels all but smuggled Édouard (and themselves) out of Paris overnight to their family retreat on the coast of Brittany. Vuillard died mere weeks later, in the arms of his longtime lover Lucy.