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Speaker 1: Happy Saturday, everybody. It is Elizabeth Louise's birthday. So today's

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Speaker 1: Saturday Classic is our episode on her, which we just

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Speaker 1: missed having ready in time for her birthday when we

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Speaker 1: originally released it. She was born in April sixte and

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Speaker 1: this episode originally came out a month after her birthday.

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Speaker 1: On MA got a couple of points in this episode.

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Speaker 1: We mostly me mentioned getting images of our artwork to

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Speaker 1: use on our website, and if you have not been

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Speaker 1: to our website in a few years, we no longer

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Speaker 1: have episode specific artwork on there, but there's still just

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Speaker 1: a ton of her work available to look at online.

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Speaker 1: It is a quick Google image search away, so we

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Speaker 1: hope you enjoy. Welcome to Stuff you missed in History

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Speaker 1: Class A production of I Heart Radio, Hello and well

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Speaker 1: come to the podcast. I'll try and I'm trade v Wilson.

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Speaker 1: And it hasn't actually happened as of when we are recording,

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Speaker 1: but by the time this episode comes out, we will

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Speaker 1: have recently passed the birthday of a very important French

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Speaker 1: artist and we do not have an episode on her.

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Speaker 1: This is what happens when we have to record like

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Speaker 1: an extra three week buffer of episodes ahead of time. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: time travel, time travel, which is fine. I kind of

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Speaker 1: wish I had thought to do it sooner in the

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Speaker 1: year so we could land this nearer her birthday, but

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Speaker 1: we didn't, uh. And A large part of her appeal

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Speaker 1: as a portrait artist was her ability to paint incredibly

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Speaker 1: flattering likenesses. She brought a lightness to her depictions that

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Speaker 1: gives them great life, and she actually made a good

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Speaker 1: living with her art. Although she always had aspirations of

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Speaker 1: working on sort of grand historical art, she was kept very,

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Speaker 1: very busy by a steady list of commissions, starting when

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Speaker 1: she was merely a teenager and lasting throughout her life.

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Speaker 1: Her works, which captured the likenesses of many royals and

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Speaker 1: nobles of her time, are seen literally throughout the world.

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Speaker 1: So if you google Marie Antoinette, you will undoubtedly see

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Speaker 1: several portraits painted by the subject of today's podcast, Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: Louise Holly is going to say that more beautifully than

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Speaker 1: me consistently throughout this entire episode. No, I'm sure I'm

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Speaker 1: clunking it up in my own magical way. So. Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: Louise Vijay was born in Paris on April sixteenth, seventeen

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Speaker 1: fifty five. Her father, Louis vj was a successful artist

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Speaker 1: who specialized in pastel portraits. Because of her father's work,

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Speaker 1: the Vijay family was afforded some access to intellectual circles

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Speaker 1: and society that otherwise would have been a little closed

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Speaker 1: off to them. As a consequence, even as a child,

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth received lessons and encouragement in her artistic pursuits by

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Speaker 1: some of the most popular artists of the day. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: she really was clearly going to be an artist no

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Speaker 1: matter what. She went to boarding school from the ages

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Speaker 1: of six to eleven, and, as I said, an artist

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Speaker 1: from the beginning. She spent most of her time, they're

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Speaker 1: drawing on just about every scrap of paper she came across.

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Speaker 1: She basically couldn't stop making art. She told one story

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Speaker 1: in her memoirs where she was sent outside and she

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Speaker 1: would draw in the sand and the dirt, portraits and

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Speaker 1: and little sketches while she was just standing there in

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Speaker 1: the yard, because she would rather be painting or drawing

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Speaker 1: than doing anything else. Because she was also a little

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Speaker 1: bit of a frail child, her parents would often take

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Speaker 1: her out of school for a few days at a time,

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Speaker 1: so she could go home and kind of recover, And

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Speaker 1: she apparently loved this because she absolutely adored her family.

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Speaker 1: She loved spending time with them, particularly her father, and

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Speaker 1: she also adored her younger brother, Etienne, who was born

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Speaker 1: three years after her. Once she was permanently removed from

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Speaker 1: boarding school, she was quite happy. But her bliss was

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Speaker 1: pretty short lived. Just a year later, her father became

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Speaker 1: seriously ill and he never recovered. He died when Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: was just twelve, and his last words to Elizabeth and

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Speaker 1: Etienne were be happy my children in and the way

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Speaker 1: her memoirs written, those might have been his last words period,

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Speaker 1: but it's not entirely clear, uh, which is so sad

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Speaker 1: and poignant, heartbreaking, And the death of her father was,

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Speaker 1: as you can imagine, really intense once she was very

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Speaker 1: young too. He had kind of been the center of

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Speaker 1: her universe, uh, and it really halted her interest in

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Speaker 1: art for a little while. She describes herself as being

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Speaker 1: unable to pick up her her pastels for a while.

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Speaker 1: But eventually the French painter Gabrielle Francois Doyen, who had

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Speaker 1: been a good friend of Louis vig urged Elizabeth to

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Speaker 1: return to her passion of drawing and painting as a

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Speaker 1: way of coping with her grief, and this is really

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Speaker 1: when she started working in earnest on portraiture. She also

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Speaker 1: started visiting galleries and museum exhibits with her mother, and

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Speaker 1: she became more fully immersed in studying the masters of painting.

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Speaker 1: She copied their styles and various portraits and studies. While

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Speaker 1: Louis had left no financial Christian for the family when

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Speaker 1: he died, she was able to make a little money

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Speaker 1: with her portrait work. But the money that was coming

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Speaker 1: in really wasn't enough to support Elizabeth, her mother, and

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Speaker 1: her brother, and so her mother remarried to a jeweler.

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Speaker 1: But the young woman Elizabeth continued to take portrait clients,

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Speaker 1: and by the age of fifteen, she had set up

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Speaker 1: a studio and began painting portraits basically as her profession,

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Speaker 1: and she quickly grew a considerable clientele. But the money

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Speaker 1: that she was making at this point went right to

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Speaker 1: her stepfather, a man who she pretty frankly detested. Her

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Speaker 1: clientele continued to grow, a fact that Elizabeth attributed not

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Speaker 1: only to her skill as a painter, but also her

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Speaker 1: own good looks. We have self portraits of her as

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Speaker 1: the artwork on our website for these episodes, and I

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Speaker 1: feel like I can see her kind of saying in

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Speaker 1: my mind, yes, I am quite pretty, not in an

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Speaker 1: arrogant way. She has a matter of fact, she's pretty

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Speaker 1: frank about it her memoirs, and she does sort of paint.

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Speaker 1: It's like, I'm not trying to brag, but people would

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Speaker 1: stare at me in public, like I was pretty because

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Speaker 1: my mother was pretty. Yes, so she would later write, quote,

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Speaker 1: since I have acknowledged that I was stared at in

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Speaker 1: the streets, the same is true of the theaters and

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Speaker 1: other public places, and that I was the object of

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Speaker 1: many attentions, that maybe it may readily be guessed that

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Speaker 1: some admirers of my face gave me commissions to paint theirs.

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Speaker 1: They hoped to get into my good graces this way.

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Speaker 1: And I kind of like though that she, while she

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Speaker 1: was very clear throughout her life that her art was

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Speaker 1: her passion, she almost tries to downplay her own skill

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Speaker 1: by going, oh, some of them just wanted to work

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Speaker 1: with me because I was pretty. Just kind of a

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Speaker 1: weird um yeah, like boast slash humbleness. At the same time,

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Speaker 1: I'm not. I'm really not sure what it is exactly

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Speaker 1: about her portraits that makes me feel like she's going, yes,

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Speaker 1: I am quite pretty. She was quite pretty. She also, though,

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Speaker 1: had this very funny way of diverting the attentions of

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Speaker 1: young men who had hired her, in her opinion, to

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Speaker 1: paint their portraits just so they could be with her. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And so she would pose them in such a way

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Speaker 1: that they would always have to be looking away from her,

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Speaker 1: And whenever she would catch them trying to move their

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Speaker 1: their eyes and gaze at her while she painted, she

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Speaker 1: would then say, I'm doing the eyes now, so that

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Speaker 1: they would have to return to the original position and

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Speaker 1: couldn't look at her. Uh. And she always had her

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Speaker 1: mother present when she was painting clients, and this amused

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Speaker 1: her mother as well. She was made a member of

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Speaker 1: the Painters Guild of the Academy de Saint Luke when

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Speaker 1: she was just nineteen, which significantly expanded her professional network

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Speaker 1: and brought in new clients. Uh. That same year, seventeen

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Speaker 1: seventy four, Elizabeth met Jean Baptiste Pierre Raboin, who was

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Speaker 1: an art dealer as well as an artist, and they

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Speaker 1: were neighbors and Elizabeth was eager to visit his home

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Speaker 1: to see his vast collections of art, and while Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: Vija was not thinking about marriage, she was making her

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Speaker 1: own money. At this point, she really didn't see any

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Speaker 1: to worry about getting married and finding a husband to

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Speaker 1: support her. Her mother really encouraged her towards Lebron romantically,

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Speaker 1: hoping to ensure a secure future for her daughter. They

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Speaker 1: got married two years later. Initially, they didn't announce their

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Speaker 1: marriage because Monsieur Lebrun was skipping out on an engagement

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Speaker 1: to the daughter of a Dutch client. During the time

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Speaker 1: their marriage was secret, Elizabeth received numerous warnings from friends

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Speaker 1: and clients that this man would not make a good husband.

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Speaker 1: He's bits of advice and dried up once the couple

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Speaker 1: went public. Four years into their marriage, they had a daughter,

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Speaker 1: Jean Julie Louise, and Elizabeth adored her baby girl. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Can you imagine being married to someone on the down

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Speaker 1: low and having people come and go, hey, look, I

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Speaker 1: know you've been kind of serious with this guy. You

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Speaker 1: should not marry him. Yeah, he's kind of a jerk. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He was not a great husband. Um aside from being

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Speaker 1: a cheater and a frequent patron of prostitutes. He, like

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth's stepfather, took all of her earnings from her art,

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Speaker 1: and then he gambled all of that away. But Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: generally described him fairly kindly in her writing, despite his faults.

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Speaker 1: She wrote, quote, his character exhibited a mixture of gentleness

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Speaker 1: and liveliness. He was extremely obliging to everybody, and in

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Speaker 1: a word, quite an agreeable person. But his furious passion

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Speaker 1: for gambling was at the bottom of the ruin of

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Speaker 1: his fortune and my own, of which she had the

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Speaker 1: entire disposal. But while Jean Baptiste was not an ideal

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Speaker 1: as a spouse, his art collection was another matter. She

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Speaker 1: studied the many paintings and prints that he amassed with

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Speaker 1: great fervor. She really loved it, and in seventy two

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Speaker 1: the couple traveled to lepai Ba the Low Countries. So

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Speaker 1: a quick geography aside, just in case you do not

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Speaker 1: know uh that designation. The Low Countries is the name

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Speaker 1: given to the coastal region of northwestern Europe that includes Luxembourg,

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Speaker 1: the Netherlands, and Belgium. While traveling in the Low Country,

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Speaker 1: Elizabeth studied another Landish art, the glaze working color palette

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Speaker 1: of Rubens was especially impactful, and it shaped the young

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Speaker 1: woman's arn't going forward from that point, and we're about

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Speaker 1: to get to the moment in her life that really

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Speaker 1: launched career into the stratosphere. But before we do that,

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Speaker 1: we're going to pause for a word from one of

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Speaker 1: our sponsors, which she was only twenty three. J Lebrun

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Speaker 1: was commissioned for an incredibly prestigious task. She was to

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Speaker 1: paint the Queen of France, Marie Antoinette. She described the

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Speaker 1: Queen at the time as incredibly lovely. Quote. Marie Antoinette

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Speaker 1: was tall and admirably built, being somewhat stout, but not

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Speaker 1: excessively so. Her arms were superb, her hands small and

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Speaker 1: perfectly formed, and her feet charming. She had the best

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Speaker 1: walk of any woman in France, carrying her head erect

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Speaker 1: with dignity that stamped her queen in the midst of

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Speaker 1: her whole court. Her majestic man, however, not the least

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Speaker 1: diminishing with sweetness and amiability of her face. To anyone

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Speaker 1: who has not seen the Queen, it is difficult to

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Speaker 1: get an idea of all the graces and all the

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Speaker 1: nobility combined in her person. And while Leo was initially

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Speaker 1: afraid of the queen, as I can't imagine anyone wouldn't

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Speaker 1: be kind of nervous doing a portrait for a royalty.

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Speaker 1: Marie Antoinette was apparently very gracious with the painter and

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Speaker 1: the two really became quite friendly. Eventually the pair would

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Speaker 1: sing together while the painter worked once she had heard

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Speaker 1: that Elizabeth was had a fairly good singing voice. They

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Speaker 1: liked to sing together while she sat for portraits, which

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Speaker 1: I find so charming. Uh. And Elizabeth's time and Versailles

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Speaker 1: working on that first portrait of Louis the sixteenth wife

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Speaker 1: really led to great success for the young artist. She

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Speaker 1: became a court artist and was well paid for the position.

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Speaker 1: She was the first woman to ever become an artist

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Speaker 1: to the king, so it was quite significant. And over

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Speaker 1: the course of the ten years from seventeen seventy nine

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Speaker 1: to seventeen eighty nine, Leboin painted thirty portraits of Marie Antoinette.

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Speaker 1: You've probably seen many of them. I would say. One

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Speaker 1: of the most famous ones that immediately comes to mind

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Speaker 1: when I imagine portraits of Marie Antoinette is one of hers. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean several. If you'd like go through your head

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Speaker 1: and go, oh, there's that other portrait of Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: and there's they're probably most of them are the ones

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Speaker 1: that Leboin painted. They're beautiful. Louis the sixteenth was also

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Speaker 1: a fan of all these portraits, and he once told

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Speaker 1: the painter quote, I know nothing about painting, but you

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Speaker 1: make me like it. I think that's so sweet. I mean,

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Speaker 1: he was a mess in many ways, but I find

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Speaker 1: that quote terribly charming. Becoming one of the queen's favorites

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Speaker 1: definitely had some benefits. In seventeen eighty three, it was

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Speaker 1: Marie Antoinette's influence that finally got the Academy Royal Pol

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Speaker 1: to accept Via Lebois as a member. This professional artist

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Speaker 1: organization of incredible prestige rarely accepted women, and Va Lebron

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Speaker 1: had been trying for years to get in, but her

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Speaker 1: husband's work as an art dealer had been a little

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Speaker 1: bit of a roadblock. It was kind of a sticking

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Speaker 1: point that maybe this was more of a business thing

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Speaker 1: than an art thing. And she was actually only one

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Speaker 1: of four women in the organization when she was admitted,

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Speaker 1: and she was and the fact that she was there

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Speaker 1: was it came with a little bit of a level

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Speaker 1: of resentment on the part of the organization. Basically, they

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Speaker 1: did not appreciate that they had been pressured by the

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Speaker 1: monarchy to accept Via Lebroin. But if you know anything

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Speaker 1: about Marie Antoinette, you know that anyone and everyone associated

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Speaker 1: with her eventually became mired in rumors and accusations as

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Speaker 1: a queen's tendency to attract scandal really radiated to all

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Speaker 1: of her friends. There was gossip that vj Lebron was

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Speaker 1: not actually an artist, but instead that her work was

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Speaker 1: done by a ghost painter, and that she had used

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Speaker 1: sexual prowess to raise her position in court. Throughout all

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Speaker 1: of this, the Vija Lebron painted. She created portraits of

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Speaker 1: many of the more famous figures of the Louis the

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Speaker 1: sixteenth court, including Madame du Berri and the Duchess de Polignac.

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Speaker 1: She had as many as three sittings per day on

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Speaker 1: her schedule, and she worked furiously to keep up with

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Speaker 1: the demand for her work. She really had an incredible

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Speaker 1: work ethic. She worked so hard that she actually became ill.

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Speaker 1: For a time, her digestion suffered. It became quite poor.

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Speaker 1: She was unable to eat, and she lost a great

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Speaker 1: deal of weight. The remedy, according to her doctor, was

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Speaker 1: to go to bed immediately after eating dinner, and that

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Speaker 1: sounds counter to a lot of modern advice. Most people

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Speaker 1: will say, don't go lie down with a heavy meal

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Speaker 1: on your stomach, but the painter really credited this habit

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Speaker 1: was saving her life, as she she really did regain

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Speaker 1: strength and put some weight back on following uh these

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Speaker 1: doctors orders. Vija Lebron was in many ways the toast

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Speaker 1: of the town at this sphase of her career. People

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Speaker 1: came to visit her at her at her home studio often,

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Speaker 1: although she believed some of them were also there to

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Speaker 1: see her husband's art collection, and she often hosted readings

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Speaker 1: by poets and impromptu opera performances. Despite being a favorite

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Speaker 1: of the Queen and part of a very vibrant French

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Speaker 1: social scene, vi Lebrun was not a slave to fashion.

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Speaker 1: She didn't really like the fashion of the day. She

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Speaker 1: found it fussy and sort of ridiculous in many ways,

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Speaker 1: and she often tried to persuade her subjects to abandon

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Speaker 1: their trendy clothing for simpler and more classical drapings when

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Speaker 1: she was painting them. If you look at a lot

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Speaker 1: of these portraits that she did, she does have them

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Speaker 1: kind of draped and just very simple robes, shawls, etcetera.

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Speaker 1: She had to have dresses specially made to go to

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Speaker 1: Versailles for her sittings with Marie Antoinette. She didn't just

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Speaker 1: have fancy clothes on hand. Uh. And she always did

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Speaker 1: her own hair, which I thought was sort of charming

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Speaker 1: as well. She also hated the powdered look of hair.

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Speaker 1: She constantly begged her clients to please sit with their

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Speaker 1: natural hair color and not powder their hair. As the

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Speaker 1: French Revolution heated up and sentiment again the royal court

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Speaker 1: really started to grow. Len eventually fled France for her

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Speaker 1: own safely safety things. It got to the point where

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Speaker 1: her home was targeted. People would shake their fists at

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Speaker 1: her when she left the house, and someone had thrown

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Speaker 1: sulfur into the cellar, which sounds awful. Yeah, I also wonder,

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Speaker 1: and I don't know, Uh, this is purely speculation, but

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Speaker 1: I wonder if that could potentially have damaged any paintings

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Speaker 1: like just the You know, if you think of an

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Speaker 1: oil painting, they take a long time to cure, and

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Speaker 1: I imagine having weird things in the air might do

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Speaker 1: some damage to some of it, but I don't know.

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Speaker 1: That's again just speculation on my part, a question mark

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Speaker 1: if anybody knows, right us and tell us. For a

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Speaker 1: long while, though, resisted her urge to leave France because

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Speaker 1: she didn't want to break the large number of commissions

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Speaker 1: that she had in her queue. She really worked constantly.

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Speaker 1: She always had people on basically a wait list just

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Speaker 1: waiting to be the to have an availability. But in

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Speaker 1: the fall of eight and she was so shaken by

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Speaker 1: some of the violent ends that many of her society

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Speaker 1: acquaintances were meeting that she had in fact decided to leave,

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Speaker 1: and so she packed her carriage and prepared her exit.

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Speaker 1: But the night before she was planning to go, several

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Speaker 1: armed men broke into her room, and they appeared to

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Speaker 1: be inebriated, and they harassed her for a while, but

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Speaker 1: they did eventually leave. Later, two of them came back

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Speaker 1: and told her that they were neighbors and meant her

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Speaker 1: no harm, but that she simply had to go. They

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Speaker 1: further advised her not to take her own carriage but

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Speaker 1: instead to take a stage coach. She took their advice

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Speaker 1: and a week later left on the first stage coach

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Speaker 1: she had been able to book, and so she was

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Speaker 1: moving and with her young daughter to Italy, and when

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Speaker 1: she did so, her French citizenship was revoked. She estimated

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Speaker 1: that in her career up to that point she had

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Speaker 1: earned more than a million francs, but thanks to her

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Speaker 1: husband's gambling, she had almost nothing to her name when

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Speaker 1: she fled. Returning to France was impossible for twelve years,

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Speaker 1: and during that time she traveled to Austria, Czechoslovakia, Germany,

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Speaker 1: and eventually Russia, which she really loved and she stayed

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Speaker 1: there for six years. Coming up, we'll get into a

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Speaker 1: bit of detail about some unfortunate events in St. Petersburg, Russia,

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Speaker 1: as well as the painters later life, But first we're

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Speaker 1: going to pause for a very word from a sponsor.

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Speaker 1: So during all of these travels, when she was outside

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Speaker 1: of France, Vi Lebois was painting portraits to earn a

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Speaker 1: living to support herself and her daughter. But this was

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Speaker 1: definitely not a case of an artist scraping by and

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Speaker 1: doing work for pittances. Elizabeth's reputation as an artist was

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Speaker 1: really impressive. She was basically welcomed into all of the

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Speaker 1: houses of rulers and dignitaries throughout any of the areas

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Speaker 1: she traveled in. They were all more than happy to

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Speaker 1: pay the gifted painter to create beautiful portraits of themselves

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Speaker 1: and their families. She lived quite well while he was

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Speaker 1: in exile. During her time away from France, Elizabeth and

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00:19:04,760 --> 00:19:08,840
Speaker 1: her husband severed their ties. In seventeen ninety three, Jean

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Speaker 1: Baptiste Pierre Le divorced his wife under duress from revolutionary

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Speaker 1: authorities who labeled Elizabeth as a deserter for having fled

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Speaker 1: the country. And in addition to the portraits which were

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Speaker 1: her bread and butter, uh I just wanted to mention

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Speaker 1: that while she was traveling, she did hundreds, literally hundreds

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Speaker 1: of landscaped pieces during her travel, somewhere in oils and

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Speaker 1: somewhere in Pastel's and those are things that didn't always

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Speaker 1: get a lot of attention from the art world, but

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Speaker 1: they're getting a little bit more, uh interest now. While

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Speaker 1: she loved St. Petersburg, particularly her relationship with her daughter

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Speaker 1: suffered there. Jean Julie Louise had grown into a lovely girl, and,

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Speaker 1: like her mother before her, received a great deal of

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Speaker 1: attention from potential suitors. When Julie as she was called,

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Speaker 1: was seventeen. She fell in love with a man about

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Speaker 1: a dozen years older because they was Degree and he

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Speaker 1: was secretary to account and when visual Lebron got wind

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Speaker 1: of this budding romance, she was first of all heartbroken

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Speaker 1: at the thought of losing her daughter. We spoke when

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Speaker 1: we mentioned her baby girl being born that she was

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Speaker 1: really devoted to her, and that stayed the case throughout

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Speaker 1: her life. She was so devoted to her child. Uh.

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Speaker 1: But then she started to ask around to get information

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Speaker 1: and opinions on Degree, but the things that she was

366
00:20:26,080 --> 00:20:28,720
Speaker 1: hearing were something of a mixed bag. Some people really

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Speaker 1: loved him and others had really little good to say

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Speaker 1: about him. But more concerning to the mother was really

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Speaker 1: the fact it almost is a repeat of how she

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Speaker 1: got into her marriage with Lebron, uh, is that she

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00:20:43,320 --> 00:20:46,199
Speaker 1: was concerned that Negree was not really well positioned. He

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Speaker 1: had an okay job, but he really didn't have like

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Speaker 1: a great job, and Elizabeth advised her daughter against marriage,

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Speaker 1: and it eventually drove a huge wedge between mother and daughter.

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Speaker 1: The couple married, and while Vija Lebrown fulfilled the duties

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Speaker 1: of the bride's family, including giving the couple a sum

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Speaker 1: of money from her recent commissions. She was not a

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Speaker 1: happy mother of the bride. When mother visited her newly

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Speaker 1: wet daughter in the weeks following the wedding, it appeared

380
00:21:13,320 --> 00:21:17,359
Speaker 1: that Julie wasn't especially happy either, although she was resigned

381
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Speaker 1: to stay and just as Visa, Lebron was coping with

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Speaker 1: the heartbreak of seeing her only child in what appeared

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Speaker 1: to be an unhappy marriage. Uh the artist's mother died,

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Speaker 1: and the combined stresses and unhappiness of these events really

385
00:21:30,960 --> 00:21:33,640
Speaker 1: took their toll, and in an effort to escape via

386
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Speaker 1: change of scenery, Lebron decided to head to Moscow in

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Speaker 1: eighteen o one, as Russia was itself in the midst

388
00:21:42,080 --> 00:21:45,320
Speaker 1: of political turmoil related to the French Revolution and shifting

389
00:21:45,359 --> 00:21:49,720
Speaker 1: loyalties via Lebron was once again ill. She continued to

390
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Speaker 1: suffer both physically and mentally, and then decided to leave

391
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Speaker 1: Russia and le Bron returned to Paris after making several

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Speaker 1: visits throughout cities in Europe. She kind of took a long,

393
00:21:59,440 --> 00:22:03,040
Speaker 1: circuitous route home and she was greeted by happy friends

394
00:22:03,040 --> 00:22:05,400
Speaker 1: and family who were overjoyed to see her once again.

395
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Speaker 1: Once She did reach Paris, but she really didn't feel

396
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Speaker 1: at home in the changed city in general. She wrote,

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Speaker 1: Paris has a less lively appearance to me. And seeing

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Speaker 1: the words liberty, fraternity, or death that were scrawled on

399
00:22:18,600 --> 00:22:20,679
Speaker 1: the walls around the city which had been part of

400
00:22:20,680 --> 00:22:23,919
Speaker 1: the revolution, really saddened her, and it reminded her of

401
00:22:23,920 --> 00:22:26,359
Speaker 1: what she what her life had once been, and what

402
00:22:26,480 --> 00:22:30,280
Speaker 1: she had lost because of her melancholy at being in

403
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Speaker 1: the city she had once loved so much. The Brown

404
00:22:33,520 --> 00:22:36,840
Speaker 1: moved to London in eighteen o two. She wasn't entirely

405
00:22:36,960 --> 00:22:40,879
Speaker 1: enamored with England either. She's found it rather drab and uninspiring,

406
00:22:41,320 --> 00:22:44,199
Speaker 1: and the damp climate meant that her paintings took a

407
00:22:44,200 --> 00:22:47,200
Speaker 1: really long time to dry. She didn't find the art

408
00:22:47,200 --> 00:22:50,520
Speaker 1: community entirely welcoming either, and some of them even printed

409
00:22:50,520 --> 00:22:53,280
Speaker 1: criticisms of the French school of art and all who

410
00:22:53,320 --> 00:22:56,119
Speaker 1: came from it. Yeah, she got kind of embroiled in

411
00:22:56,160 --> 00:22:59,119
Speaker 1: a back and forth with another artist who printed some

412
00:22:59,240 --> 00:23:02,880
Speaker 1: nasty things quite clearly aimed at her uh and she

413
00:23:03,280 --> 00:23:06,639
Speaker 1: wrote him a letter in defense of of the French

414
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Speaker 1: artists that circulated among society. Like everyone knew about this letter,

415
00:23:11,640 --> 00:23:15,480
Speaker 1: so it was good, not the best welcome in terms

416
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Speaker 1: of that, although she did have friends there. But shortly

417
00:23:18,119 --> 00:23:21,080
Speaker 1: after visual leb arrived in London, the treat of the

418
00:23:21,160 --> 00:23:24,280
Speaker 1: Treaty of Amiens was signed, and as part of that treaty,

419
00:23:24,359 --> 00:23:26,640
Speaker 1: any French person in England who had been there less

420
00:23:26,640 --> 00:23:29,840
Speaker 1: than a year was to be sent out of the country.

421
00:23:29,880 --> 00:23:33,080
Speaker 1: But because Elizabeth did move in illustrious circles, the Prince

422
00:23:33,119 --> 00:23:35,760
Speaker 1: of Wales was able to secure a special permission from

423
00:23:35,800 --> 00:23:39,080
Speaker 1: King George the Third that enabled her to stay. She

424
00:23:39,160 --> 00:23:41,919
Speaker 1: remained in England for almost three years, visiting all of

425
00:23:41,920 --> 00:23:45,760
Speaker 1: the royal residences and castles. You could possibly imagine. Her

426
00:23:45,880 --> 00:23:47,760
Speaker 1: memoir just sort of lists them one after the other.

427
00:23:47,800 --> 00:23:49,199
Speaker 1: It's like, and then I went to this place, and

428
00:23:49,240 --> 00:23:51,240
Speaker 1: here's what I thought of the gardens and their art collection.

429
00:23:51,320 --> 00:23:53,480
Speaker 1: And it's like a long travel log of all the

430
00:23:53,520 --> 00:23:56,359
Speaker 1: places she visited. But she did move back to Paris

431
00:23:56,440 --> 00:23:59,639
Speaker 1: in eighteen o five. She had really just gotten settled

432
00:23:59,680 --> 00:24:02,280
Speaker 1: into a life she quite enjoyed in England, with a

433
00:24:02,359 --> 00:24:06,359
Speaker 1: well cultivated social circle and plenty of enjoyable invitations just

434
00:24:06,400 --> 00:24:09,320
Speaker 1: about anywhere she might want to go. But she had

435
00:24:09,359 --> 00:24:12,080
Speaker 1: gotten word that her daughter had returned to Paris, and

436
00:24:12,160 --> 00:24:15,359
Speaker 1: she hurried to see her. Julie and her husband had

437
00:24:15,400 --> 00:24:18,480
Speaker 1: traveled to France on business, but when that business concluded,

438
00:24:18,720 --> 00:24:22,639
Speaker 1: Nigre returned to St. Petersburg. Julie did not, and in

439
00:24:22,720 --> 00:24:25,840
Speaker 1: her memoirs, Elizabeth is not the least bit subtle about

440
00:24:25,920 --> 00:24:29,520
Speaker 1: happy how happy the couple split made her. From eighteen

441
00:24:29,520 --> 00:24:32,680
Speaker 1: o five on, Elizabeth lived in France for the rest

442
00:24:32,680 --> 00:24:34,960
Speaker 1: of her life. She spent the time between Paris and

443
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:38,160
Speaker 1: the country is She really loved being in the country.

444
00:24:38,160 --> 00:24:41,520
Speaker 1: It was very inspiring to her um. But then over

445
00:24:41,560 --> 00:24:43,920
Speaker 1: the course of seven years, there was a great deal

446
00:24:43,960 --> 00:24:48,120
Speaker 1: of heartbreak in vig Lebron's life. First, in eighteen thirteen,

447
00:24:48,160 --> 00:24:51,120
Speaker 1: her former husband Jean Baptiste died, and while they had

448
00:24:51,119 --> 00:24:54,080
Speaker 1: been divorced for some time, the death really did affect

449
00:24:54,119 --> 00:24:58,280
Speaker 1: her deeply, and she grieved for him. Six years later,

450
00:24:58,400 --> 00:25:02,440
Speaker 1: in eighteen nineteen, Jean Jowe Louise became ill and her

451
00:25:02,440 --> 00:25:07,520
Speaker 1: health rapidly deteriorated. When she died, Elizabeth was devastated, but

452
00:25:07,720 --> 00:25:11,879
Speaker 1: just one year later, Elizabeth's brother Etienne, also died. To

453
00:25:11,960 --> 00:25:15,240
Speaker 1: cope with her grief, be Lebron traveled to Bordeaux, a

454
00:25:15,359 --> 00:25:18,760
Speaker 1: town she wasn't really familiar with. The complete shift of

455
00:25:18,840 --> 00:25:22,160
Speaker 1: mindset from exclusively mourning to also discovering a new place

456
00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:24,919
Speaker 1: seems to have really helped the painter get through this

457
00:25:25,000 --> 00:25:27,760
Speaker 1: difficult time, and she reported that her health improved on

458
00:25:27,760 --> 00:25:31,280
Speaker 1: the journey, also that her spirit was quote less dark

459
00:25:31,400 --> 00:25:34,280
Speaker 1: when she returned to Paris, and from that point on

460
00:25:34,400 --> 00:25:38,000
Speaker 1: her brother's two daughters, her nieces Madame de Riviere and

461
00:25:38,040 --> 00:25:42,840
Speaker 1: Eugenia lebro became her dearest relatives and closest friends. In

462
00:25:42,920 --> 00:25:46,000
Speaker 1: eighteen thirty five, urged on by her friend Princess Helene

463
00:25:46,040 --> 00:25:50,159
Speaker 1: Delgaruki of Russia, via Lebrium, published the first volume of

464
00:25:50,160 --> 00:25:54,280
Speaker 1: her three volume memoir titled Souvenir Dema VI. The next

465
00:25:54,280 --> 00:25:57,879
Speaker 1: two volumes were published during the following two years, and

466
00:25:57,920 --> 00:26:00,600
Speaker 1: in the opening of that memoir, when to describing her

467
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:05,200
Speaker 1: natural proclivity toward art, Lebron wrote a passage that really

468
00:26:05,280 --> 00:26:09,000
Speaker 1: beautifully encapsulated her whole life. She wrote, quote I mentioned

469
00:26:09,080 --> 00:26:11,520
Speaker 1: these facts to show what an inborn passion for the

470
00:26:11,640 --> 00:26:15,399
Speaker 1: art I possessed. Nor has that passion ever diminished. It

471
00:26:15,440 --> 00:26:17,919
Speaker 1: seems to me that it has even gone on growing

472
00:26:17,960 --> 00:26:20,240
Speaker 1: with time. For today. I feel under the spell of

473
00:26:20,280 --> 00:26:23,080
Speaker 1: it as much as ever, and shall I hope until

474
00:26:23,119 --> 00:26:28,000
Speaker 1: the hour of death. Lebrun died in Paris on March

475
00:26:29,119 --> 00:26:32,560
Speaker 1: forty two, at the age of eight six. And she

476
00:26:32,640 --> 00:26:36,640
Speaker 1: did really paint right up until the end of her life. Uh.

477
00:26:36,640 --> 00:26:40,879
Speaker 1: In October of last year, the first monographic exhibition of

478
00:26:40,920 --> 00:26:43,840
Speaker 1: visions Lebroin's work to be mounted in her home country

479
00:26:44,240 --> 00:26:47,240
Speaker 1: went on display at the Grand Palais in Paris, France.

480
00:26:47,880 --> 00:26:50,520
Speaker 1: That was also somewhere that she had visited as a child.

481
00:26:50,920 --> 00:26:53,000
Speaker 1: And that exhibit is now on tour, so if you

482
00:26:53,040 --> 00:26:54,639
Speaker 1: are lucky, you might be in a place where you

483
00:26:54,680 --> 00:26:56,879
Speaker 1: can see it. It is currently at the met in

484
00:26:56,960 --> 00:26:59,879
Speaker 1: New York until mid May. I actually posted one of

485
00:26:59,920 --> 00:27:03,000
Speaker 1: the portraits that she did a Marie Intoinette and her children.

486
00:27:03,080 --> 00:27:06,920
Speaker 1: It's the one people sometimes wonder about the empty baby bassinet,

487
00:27:06,960 --> 00:27:09,760
Speaker 1: and it's because they had lost their fourth child, so

488
00:27:09,800 --> 00:27:13,639
Speaker 1: that is depicted empty because the child is gone. UH.

489
00:27:13,680 --> 00:27:16,400
Speaker 1: That will be, as I said, in New York until May,

490
00:27:16,520 --> 00:27:18,680
Speaker 1: and then it moves to the National Gallery of Canada

491
00:27:18,720 --> 00:27:21,840
Speaker 1: in Ottawa in June. UH. And you can also check

492
00:27:21,840 --> 00:27:23,560
Speaker 1: out I think we have a we'll have a link

493
00:27:23,640 --> 00:27:27,640
Speaker 1: to um the either the METS page or another one

494
00:27:27,640 --> 00:27:31,320
Speaker 1: that will show the the travel schedule. I'm not sure

495
00:27:31,320 --> 00:27:34,200
Speaker 1: where it goes from there, but it's spectacular. I really

496
00:27:34,600 --> 00:27:37,960
Speaker 1: She's one of those artists that I have often admired

497
00:27:38,119 --> 00:27:40,760
Speaker 1: throughout the years, even before I realized, like all of

498
00:27:40,760 --> 00:27:43,640
Speaker 1: these portraits that I was in love with were all her. Yeah,

499
00:27:43,680 --> 00:27:46,639
Speaker 1: it was not a name that I immediately recognized, just

500
00:27:46,760 --> 00:27:49,800
Speaker 1: because on paper, to me, it looks like French soup.

501
00:27:52,160 --> 00:27:55,760
Speaker 1: So when I this morning before we recorded, I was

502
00:27:55,800 --> 00:27:57,640
Speaker 1: tracking down all the artwork that we would use when

503
00:27:57,640 --> 00:27:59,480
Speaker 1: we put us on our website, and I had just

504
00:27:59,480 --> 00:28:02,440
Speaker 1: plunged hern Aim into one of the stock image sources

505
00:28:02,480 --> 00:28:04,640
Speaker 1: that we use, and the only thing that it returned

506
00:28:04,680 --> 00:28:06,600
Speaker 1: was this portrait of Marie Antoinette. And I had this

507
00:28:06,600 --> 00:28:09,879
Speaker 1: moment where I was like, but that's Marie Antoinette, And

508
00:28:09,920 --> 00:28:14,359
Speaker 1: then oh, right now I completely recognized, like all this

509
00:28:14,440 --> 00:28:17,119
Speaker 1: woman's portraits because I've seen a lot of them and

510
00:28:17,160 --> 00:28:21,200
Speaker 1: they have a very uh there's a look about them

511
00:28:21,280 --> 00:28:23,280
Speaker 1: that you can recognize after you look at them for

512
00:28:23,280 --> 00:28:26,200
Speaker 1: a while. Yeah, Like I mentioned at the top, there's

513
00:28:26,200 --> 00:28:28,040
Speaker 1: a lightness to them, the way she used light in

514
00:28:28,080 --> 00:28:32,600
Speaker 1: her portraits was very lovely, and she really none of

515
00:28:32,600 --> 00:28:36,040
Speaker 1: her portraits ever have a heavy feel like, even when

516
00:28:36,040 --> 00:28:39,200
Speaker 1: she's using darker tones, they all just have sort of

517
00:28:39,200 --> 00:28:44,240
Speaker 1: a feeling of brightness and uh, just lightness, even the

518
00:28:44,280 --> 00:28:47,120
Speaker 1: sad ones. Incidentally, that that portrait that I had just

519
00:28:47,200 --> 00:28:50,280
Speaker 1: mentioned of Marie Antoinette with her children, which was kind

520
00:28:50,280 --> 00:28:52,640
Speaker 1: of commissioned by the king in an effort to portray

521
00:28:54,080 --> 00:28:57,239
Speaker 1: his wife, you know, as a loving mother in the

522
00:28:57,240 --> 00:28:59,320
Speaker 1: hopes of kind of fixing a little bit of her

523
00:28:59,360 --> 00:29:03,840
Speaker 1: image at the time time, is one that La mentions

524
00:29:03,840 --> 00:29:08,440
Speaker 1: in her memoirs that the revolution or Marie Antoinette's grief

525
00:29:08,480 --> 00:29:11,040
Speaker 1: over the loss of that baby really saved that piece

526
00:29:11,080 --> 00:29:12,960
Speaker 1: of art from the revolution because it was in the

527
00:29:13,040 --> 00:29:16,840
Speaker 1: hall and Marie Antoinette would have to walk by it

528
00:29:17,720 --> 00:29:19,760
Speaker 1: on her way, I believe, to her dressing room, and

529
00:29:19,800 --> 00:29:22,000
Speaker 1: she finally was like, I can't look at this painting anymore.

530
00:29:22,000 --> 00:29:23,920
Speaker 1: It makes me sad every time I see it, and

531
00:29:23,960 --> 00:29:26,320
Speaker 1: it's too upsetting, and so they took it down, and

532
00:29:26,360 --> 00:29:28,080
Speaker 1: that's why it was not one of the things that

533
00:29:28,160 --> 00:29:32,320
Speaker 1: was damaged when the palace was ransacked. So sort of

534
00:29:32,400 --> 00:29:34,600
Speaker 1: grief sort of saved that portrait for us, So we're

535
00:29:34,640 --> 00:29:39,880
Speaker 1: lucky in that regard. But yeah, I just her memoirs.

536
00:29:39,920 --> 00:29:43,200
Speaker 1: I highly recommend. They're a pretty fun read. They're very lighthearted.

537
00:29:43,280 --> 00:29:45,360
Speaker 1: It's kind of interesting because she had this marriage that

538
00:29:45,440 --> 00:29:48,800
Speaker 1: wasn't great. You know, she had had a stepfather she

539
00:29:48,920 --> 00:29:51,640
Speaker 1: was not very fond of. Even when she's talking about

540
00:29:51,720 --> 00:29:54,479
Speaker 1: these deaths that really impacted her, she kind of whips

541
00:29:54,520 --> 00:29:56,920
Speaker 1: by them pretty quickly. She keeps it very light and

542
00:29:56,960 --> 00:29:59,280
Speaker 1: a lot of her memoirs are about the fabulous parties

543
00:29:59,320 --> 00:30:02,040
Speaker 1: she went to and fabulous people she met, and sort

544
00:30:02,080 --> 00:30:04,840
Speaker 1: of she was really into the social scene. And to me,

545
00:30:04,960 --> 00:30:08,560
Speaker 1: it's an interesting juxtaposition because someone that writes so much

546
00:30:08,640 --> 00:30:11,920
Speaker 1: like that, you wouldn't expect to be a completely devoted workhorse.

547
00:30:12,320 --> 00:30:15,320
Speaker 1: But she was basically like working her tail off all

548
00:30:15,400 --> 00:30:17,160
Speaker 1: day long to do all of these sittings and paint

549
00:30:17,200 --> 00:30:19,479
Speaker 1: portraits and keep up with her client list, and then

550
00:30:19,520 --> 00:30:21,480
Speaker 1: at night she was going to fabulous parties. And it

551
00:30:21,560 --> 00:30:23,520
Speaker 1: was just like this terrific life that she had put

552
00:30:23,560 --> 00:30:26,400
Speaker 1: together for herself that she really seemed to love. Like

553
00:30:26,480 --> 00:30:28,680
Speaker 1: she was like, I designed this life, I'm living it,

554
00:30:28,720 --> 00:30:31,680
Speaker 1: and I love it, and it's very admirable, and she

555
00:30:31,880 --> 00:30:35,720
Speaker 1: kind of doesn't even um tend to focus very much

556
00:30:35,720 --> 00:30:37,360
Speaker 1: on the fact that she was kind of breaking a

557
00:30:37,400 --> 00:30:39,800
Speaker 1: lot of glass ceilings for women artists at the time.

558
00:30:39,880 --> 00:30:42,160
Speaker 1: She's just like, oh, yeah, you know, I was cute,

559
00:30:42,160 --> 00:30:44,040
Speaker 1: so some people wanted me to paint their picture and

560
00:30:44,080 --> 00:30:47,320
Speaker 1: I was doing some really neat things. Yeah, it's it's

561
00:30:47,400 --> 00:30:49,880
Speaker 1: very unassuming, even when she's talking about how beautiful she

562
00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:52,800
Speaker 1: was as a young woman, and I just I clearly

563
00:30:52,800 --> 00:31:01,080
Speaker 1: love her. Pay so much for joining on this Saturday.

564
00:31:01,360 --> 00:31:03,440
Speaker 1: Since this episode is out of the archive, if you

565
00:31:03,520 --> 00:31:05,560
Speaker 1: heard an email address or a Facebook U r L

566
00:31:05,680 --> 00:31:08,000
Speaker 1: or something similar over the course of the show, that

567
00:31:08,200 --> 00:31:12,160
Speaker 1: could be obsolete now. Our current email address is History

568
00:31:12,280 --> 00:31:16,400
Speaker 1: Podcast at I heart radio dot com. Our old health

569
00:31:16,440 --> 00:31:19,600
Speaker 1: stuff works email address no longer works, and you can

570
00:31:19,640 --> 00:31:22,800
Speaker 1: find us all over social media at missed in History

571
00:31:23,040 --> 00:31:26,000
Speaker 1: and you can subscribe to our show on Apple podcasts,

572
00:31:26,080 --> 00:31:29,280
Speaker 1: Google podcasts, the I heart Radio app, and wherever else

573
00:31:29,320 --> 00:31:35,320
Speaker 1: you listen to podcasts. Stuff you Missed in History Class

574
00:31:35,360 --> 00:31:38,440
Speaker 1: is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts

575
00:31:38,480 --> 00:31:42,000
Speaker 1: from I heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcasts,

576
00:31:42,120 --> 00:31:44,160
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,