A selection from the memoir of Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun, the renowned eighteenth-century French portraitist and one of the most important women painters in art history

In her memoir, Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun offers a candid and thoroughly enjoyable account of her life and art. She relates her encounters among the royalty and aristocracy she painted––including, most famously, her patron Marie Antoinette––and the effusive reception they extended to her across Europe. Her observations provide unique insight into the art world of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Europe, a time when women were rarely allowed success.