Nico Narrates Audiobooks: French Female Painters - Adélaïde Labille-Guiard and Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun

Adélaïde Labille-Guiard

(French, 1749–1803)

Adélaïde Labille-Guiard was first apprenticed to a miniaturist and later, in 1769, studied the art of pastel with Maurice Quentin de La Tour. The rich palette and fine detail in the present picture, one of the earliest of her major works in oils, reflect her earlier training. In 1783, when Labille-Guiard and Vigée Le Brun were admitted to the French Academy, the number of women artists eligible for membership was limited to four, and this painting, which was exhibited to an admiring audience at the Salon of 1785, has been interpreted as a propaganda piece, arguing for the place of women in the Academy. The artist's fashionable dress asserts her femininity; the feminist mood is emphasized by the presence of her pupils and the statue of the Vestal Virgin in the background. Labille-Guiard achieved a certain success at court and, having painted a number of portraits of the aunts of Louis XVI, came to be known as Peintre des Mesdames. However, she sympathized with the Revolution and, unlike Vigée Le Brun, remained in France throughout her life.

Self-Portrait with Two Pupils, Mademoiselle Marie Gabrielle Capet (1761–1818) and Mademoiselle Carreaux de Rosemond (died 1788), 1785
Adélaïde Labille-Guiard (French, 1749–1803)
Oil on canvas

Portrait of François-André Vincent, painted in 1795 by Labille-Guiard, Musée du Louvre. They married in 1800.

Élisabeth-Louise Vigée Le Brun

(1755-1842)

Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun was a French painter, and is recognized as the most important female painter of the 18th century. Her style is generally considered Rococo and shows interest in the subject of neoclassical painting

Self-portrait, by Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, 1782, Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas. She was a contemporary of Labille-Guiard and the two's works were often compared