Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun

Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun was an 18th century French portrait painter who rose to prominence through her paintings of Queen Marie Antoinette. The artist’s style bridged the Rococo and Neoclassical genres, with her popularity with the court and high society making her one of the most sought-after portraitists in France.

Born in April 1755, Vigée Le Brun was introduced to art by her father, who was a successful portrait painter. She wasn’t allowed to receive formal training at the Académie Royale (Royal Academy) due to her gender and was largely self-taught. The artist learnt by studying Old Masters alongside observing contemporary painters, though she also received some tutorship from artists Claude Joseph Vernet, Gabriel-François Doyen and Jean-Baptiste Greuze.

Vigée Le Brun demonstrated talent from a young age and was already attracting clients while a teenager. When she was 19, her studio was closed as artists weren’t allowed to work without guild or academy membership — which Vigée Le Brun had been denied due to her gender. Though she wasn’t able to join the Académie Royale, she managed to join the Académie de Saint-Luc in 1774, who admitted more female members. This guild membership helped grow her connections, and her network of patrons further expanded when she married art dealer Jean-Baptiste-Pierre Le Brun in 1776.

Vigée Le Brun was invited to Versailles to paint Queen Marie Antoinette in 1778. The queen was impressed by the artist's flattering approach to portraiture, with her works being distinct for their elegant style and emotional expression. She went on to paint more than 30 sittings of the queen over the next decade, with the portraits presenting the monarch as approachable yet dignified during a time of political unrest. Royal intervention also meant Vigée Le Brun was finally able to join Paris’ Académie Royale, making her one of only four female members.

The outbreak of the French revolution in 1789 had a dramatic impact on Vigée Le Brun’s career. Her closeness to the Royal family meant she left France with her daughter and spent the next 12 years working across Europe, where she painted nobility and members of the aristocracy. While living outside France, Vigée Le Brun painted several self-portraits, including one in 1794 which was sold by Christie’s in 2017 for US$1.5 million.

When she returned to France in the early 19th century, the artist spilt her time between her Paris residence and her country house at Louveciennes. Vigée Le Brun died in 1842, with scholars estimating she produced more than 600 paintings during her lifetime. Her works are renowned for their sophistication and warmth, with the artist achieving remarkable success within a male-dominated art world. Vigée Le Brun's memoir Souvenirs, published in the 1830s, has also been translated and reprinted numerous times.