Portrait de Lise Cristiani HD (© documentation Waldemar Kamer).tif

I have had some rather splendid trips, a little wild, quite dangerous, highly glorious and fairly poor. […] I will never complain about this, because I claim that a true artist must sometimes travel for the body and often for the mind. If this maxim does not make you rich, at least it prevents you from being quite so stupid. That is already this to be gained.

Lise B. Cristiani

Cellist Cellist of the King of Denmark,

of Kamchatka and other unknown

and misknown countries

Lise Barbier Cristiani (1825–1853) was the first woman to perform on stage with a cello and the first Western musician to travel across Siberia to the Kamchatka Peninsula. Born in Paris, she died in Novocherkassk in the Caucasus at the age of 27. Some mysteries of her unconventional life have now been clarified thanks to publications in several countries. Here they are brought together.