Relocating to Paris, Haweis and Loy married there, in the 14th Arrondissement, on 13 December 1903 – Loy was twenty-one, and four months pregnant.[20][21] Initially they agreed that it would be just a marriage of convenience, but Stephen became quickly more possessive and demanding. Instead of taking her husband's name, after their marriage she changed her last name from "Lowy" to "Loy."[22] Becoming Modern: The Life of Mina Loy (1996) biographer Carolyn Burke notes that "[t]he anagrammatic shifts of Lowy into Loy and later Lloyd symbolize her attempts to resolve personal crises and chooses to refer to Loy as Mina – the name that stayed fixed as her surname varied."[23]
Starting in 1903 until 1904, after meeting the Englishman Henry Coles, Haweis began selling photographies d'art, or fine art photography pieces, influenced by Art Nouveau style. The most notable commission of this time was the photographing of the recent works of Auguste Rodin which came about after Haweis met with Rodin himself.[24] At that time, Loy was Haweis's favourite subject to photograph; this is something which Loy never commented on.[24] As Haweis gained more contacts and work, Loy became increasingly isolated and heavily pregnant.
Loy's first child, Oda, was born on 27 May 1903. The labour was hard, as recalled in the early poem "Parturition" (first published in The Trend 8:1, October 1914).[25] The opening details:
I am the centre Of a circle of pain Exceeding its boundaries in every direction The business of the bland sun Has no affair with me In my congested cosmos of agony From which there is no escape [...][25]
Whilst Loy was in labour through the night, Haweis was absent with his mistress. Loy records this in "Parturition" thus:
The irresponsibility of the male Leaves woman her superior Inferiority. He is running upstairs[25]
Two days after her first birthday, Oda died of meningitis and Loy was left completely bereft with grief over the loss.[23] A day or so after Oda's death Loy reportedly painted a (now lost) tempera painting The Wooden Mother in which she depicted two mothers with their children, one being a "foolish-looking mother holding her baby, whose small fingers are raised in an impotent blessing over the other anguished mother who, on her knees, curses them both with great, upraised, clenched fists, and her own baby sprawling dead with little arms and legs outstretched lifeless."[26]
Loy decided to enter the Salon d'Automne under the name "Mina Loy" (having dropped the "w" in Lowy) in 1905. That autumn she exhibited six watercolours and the following spring she exhibited two watercolours at the Salon des Beaux-Art of 1906.[27] After the latter exhibition, Loy was written of favourably in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts:
Mlle Mina Loy who, in her uncommon watercolours where Guys, Rops and Beardsley are combined shows us ambiguous ephebes whose nudity is caressed by ladies dressed in furbelows of 1855.[28]
After this positive reception Loy was asked to become a sociétaire of the drawing category, which meant that her work could be exhibited without having to pass through a selection committee. This was a "vote of confidence" which, as biographer Burke recognises, "was an exceptional mark of recognition for an unknown Englishwoman of twenty-three".[29]
By 1906 Loy and Haweis had agreed to live separately. During this period of separation Loy was treated by a French doctor named Henry Joël le Savoureux for neurasthenia, which had worsened with the death of Oda and living with Haweis, and the pair embarked on an affair which would end with her becoming pregnant. This made Haweis jealous and precipitated their move to Florence, where there were fewer people who knew them.[30]
