Bust of Vigée Le Brun

LM sends me a photo of a terra cotta bust (at 30” tall) of a gorgeous young French female of the late 18th century. Her beauty is classic even today: flowing hair, effortless smile, full cheeks, upturned almond shaped eyes, a heart-shaped face. Madame Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun (1755-1842) was not only one of the most beautiful women of her time, but she was Europe’s most celebrated oil portrait artist. If the bust is original to 1783, it is worth $40,000, if it is a 19th century reproduction, $4,000.

This image of Vigée Le Brun was created by the most notable sculptor of the time for portrait busts, Augustin Pajou (1730-1809). A portrait bust in clay was ‘la haute mode’ of the late 18th century, and many noble personages were depicted in clay as a bust on a marble stand – most notable Madame du Barry and Marie-Antoinette, also created by this celebrated sculptor. 

Vigée Le Brun was 28 when she sat for this bust, created by Pajou to commemorate her admission into the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in 1783 – one of only five female artists that had been allowed to become an ‘academician’ during the course of 50 years of French painting, which meant that she could show her work at the Salons and Galleries of late 18th century France. 

Because she was both beautiful – and rare – as a female portrait artist, she garnered the attention of Marie-Antoinette, entering French high society. In the 1780s she became personal portrait painter to Marie-Antoinette and the Queen’s close confidant. 

Not only was Vigée Le Brun well connected, she was well respected. The head of the British Royal Academy, Joshua Reynolds, called Vigée Le Brun one of the greatest portrait painters of all time. Although not recognized until the 20th century, Vigée Le Brun was the most important portrait painter of the Ancien Régime – in her career she painted 660 notable personages. 

Her most notable works are portraits of herself and her daughter, Julie (nicknamed “Brunette”). The mother-daughter saga of how and why Vigée Le Brun documented Julie in her paintings is remarkable. For example, in 1787, Vigée Le Brun caused a scandal at the Royal Academy, contravening all portraiture conventions by painting a portrait of herself with a broad smile – showing teeth! And her three-year-old daughter, smiling too! A toothy smile was considered scandalous in art, and a mother-daughter image was also not “high” art. 

In 1787, Vigée submitted three portraits of her daughter to the French Royal Academy. One, a poignant Julie Le Brun as Flora, portrayed Julie as the Goddess of Flowers – the same mythological creature who will soon (against the mother’s wishes) be abducted by Zephyr and lost. If Vigée was foreseeing the future, she picked the right goddess: Julie married against her mother’s wishes shortly thereafter, and parted company with her mother. 

Vigée Le Brun was herself a force to be reckoned with from an early age. Her mother insisted that she be wed at age 20; but she had been painting portraits and earning her own money since she was 13. So why marry? She did marry an older man (an art dealer!) who enjoyed gambling and other women: the marriage was not successful (and she kept her maiden name). She asked for a divorce after 15 years of marriage; she demanded her parent’s money – her bride dowry – back (unheard of) and remained single. 

She lived and worked in revolutionary France. A celebrity artist who painted titled individuals in the early 1780s was thought to be on the ‘side’ of the monarchy, and Vigée Le Brun was pursued in 1789 by angry mobs. She escaped France with her daughter and nanny to Italy dressed in shabby clothing travelling in an old cart. 

She quicky became the darling of any city she visited in Europe: Vigée Le Brun painted the great crowned heads of Europe for 12 years as an émigrée. While painting in Venice in 1793, France came to call on her again. Napoleon Bonaparte captured Venice and all Venetian bank assets, including Vigée Le Brun’s money. 

In spite of a tumultuous existence, she lived a long life, returning to France to author books on her art and techniques. A remarkable artist who was ahead of her time as both a painter and a woman, she had to wait for contemporary recognition until 1982 when her first retrospective was held at the Kimball Art Museum in Fort Worth, followed by her International Retrospective at the MET in 2016.