Artist Élisabeth-Louise Vigée Le Brun

Elizabeth Vigee-Lebrun (Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun), a beautiful and cautious careerist, was really adored by Queen Marie Antoinette and Empress Catherine II could not stand to disgust her. Why - this will become evident after reading the artist's biography.

Marie Elisabeth Louise Vigée-Lebrun was born in 1755 in the household of Louis Vigee, a bourgeois "lower classes" artist who was neither especially successful or affluent. The girl began drawing nearly from birth. Her father guided her first steps, but he died at a young age. The mother, who was known for her quarrelsome and nasty personality, quickly remarried, and the very young Elizabeth was sent away to learn to draw and earn her own food.

Elisabeth Vigee's paintings and sketches had one significant quality: they were pleasing to the public at first glance. She had regular clients by the age of 16. Also, some particularly astute followers signed up for picture sessions in order to become acquainted with the artist, a happy and attractive woman.

Elizabeth's sensible personality blended well with her frivolous looks. Hailing from a poor background, she married Jean Baptiste Lebrun, a friend from the painting school, at the age of 21. Lebrun was a mediocre artist, but an exceptional art trader and rogue. The newly minted Madame Vigee-assessment Lebrun's was correct: not only did the quantity of orders grow, but so did the rank of consumers. Elizabeth is now asked to write literally "to the wealthiest households in Paris," and she is patronized by the richest de Verdun family as well as certain members of the Bourbon dynasty.

Vigée-clean Lebrun's and model-idealizing approach eventually becomes popular at Versailles. She receives an offer to write to Louis XVI's wife. Vigée-Lebrun plans to create at least thirty portraits of Marie Antoinette, including half-length, full-length, and surrounded by children and others.

The phrase "Do they have no bread?" was coined by the last French monarch. Let them to eat cake! Of course, Vigée-inventiveness Lebrun's (an overabundance of molasses and insufficient "bread" - live and actual flesh) appealed to her. Marie Antoinette made Elizabeth her friend, and they became intimate, going on promenades in the palace garden, having fun, and even singing duets.

Isn't it amazing that Vigée-Lebrun, who is simply a representative of the "third estate" by social position, has suddenly gained such an honor, nearly closeness with the monarchy? It's hardly unexpected, given that "Austrian" Marie Antoinette was always viewed as a stranger in France and felt as such. She required sympathy. And Vigee-Lebrun understood how to flatter delicately, both verbally and through her vignette paintings.

Vigée-Lebrun wrote journals throughout her life. Her long memoirs have been published in part. Yet, despite being labeled as "very feminine" (read: self-centered and shallow), Vigée-notebooks Lebrun's contain a lot of insightful insights about her contemporaries. "Sugary praise and a bit poison" is how you may characterize the traits she bestowed onto you right and left. "The queen is tall and finely formed, but rather overweight," wrote Vigee-Lebrun of Marie Antoinette.