Adélaïde Labille-Guiard (with Bridget Quinn)

Vulgar History Podcast

Adélaïde Labille-Guiard (with Bridget Quinn) 

November 6, 2024

Hello, and welcome to Vulgar History, a feminist women’s history comedy podcast, my name is Ann Foster. I’m your host and I don’t know if you can hear, but my co-host Hepburn, my cat, is here really close to the microphone, but I need to record this so we’re doing it together. So, this week, we’re doing an episode that is part of our ongoing series Season Seven, where we’re looking at revolutions happening all over the world, but specifically at the moment, we’re looking a lot at the French Revolution, because it’s all leading up to our goal of learning about Marie Antoinette. And we’re really populating the story and kind of the city of Paris with… There’s a lot of stuff going on. This is why this is going to be, like, a lengthy season before we make our way to Marie Antoinette. But in this week’s episode, we are kind of joining some pieces together, there are some people who are going to come up in this episode we’ve talked about before. 

Who we’re talking about today, the main character of the day, is a French painter who you, I’m going to say most of you have probably not heard of, named [French accent] Adélaïde Labille-Guillard, who in English, her name is Adelaide, and we’ll explain in the episode why we’re going to call her that. But I had a lot of fun saying her name just now. So, I’m joined today for this episode by author Bridget Quinn, who has written a recent book about [French accent] Adélaïde Labille-Guillard and the full title of her book, which I want to give it all to respect, Portrait of a Woman: Art, Rivalry, and Revolution in the Life of Adélaïde Labille-Guillard by Bridget Quinn. It’s a really lovely book. We talk about the book construction. I don’t want to, like, say everything now but it’s a beautiful book. It’s a book about an artist, and there’s lots and lots and lots of colour illustrations in it so you can really understand the art that this woman did. 

Anyway, that’s enough preamble. Hepburn wants me to get along with things, so please enjoy this conversation with Bridget Quinn about Portrait of a Woman and about Adélaïde Labille-Guillard. 

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Ann: So welcome, Bridget Quinn, author of Portrait of a Woman. 

Bridget: Thank you! I thought you were going to say the whole subtitle. Would you like me to say it? 

Ann: Please say the whole subtitle. [laughs]

Bridget: [laughs] Because it’s so stressful, that’s why it’s the subtitle. Art, Rivalry, and Revolution in the Life of Adélaïde Labille-Guillard, who, from now on, we will call Adelaide. 

Ann: Which I appreciate as an English-speaking person. 

Bridget: Same. 

Ann: Yeah, I wonder if people in France now, but also then, when you have a long name like that with multiple syllables, surely there must have been a nickname. You can’t go around calling people extremely long names. There are so many people who are Jean-Michel, blah-blah, blah-blah. Everyone has all these names. 

Bridget: I think it’s rude, I think, now to shorten a double name, a hyphenated name, but in the past, in the 18th century, it was very common, it’s actually more common that people have a hyphenated first name too. And fortunately for me, as an English-speaking writer, both of my major characters have a single first name. So, I could at least default to that, which was very nice. 

Ann: I appreciate also just as I’ve been… You’re a listener to the podcast so you know, but I’ve been learning about this era and the French Revolution and everything, and I’m just excited when someone is not named Marie, because… 

Bridget: I know. Well, almost everyone is. 

Ann: Everyone is called Marie!

Bridget: [laughs] And so, I think it was actually very common in the 18th century to have Marie, Mary, right? So, it’s a Catholic country, to have that as part of a hyphenated name, and then usually they would use the second name. 

Ann: As the first name. And that’s somebody, like, in modern times, there’s a woman who I used to work with, and her name was technically Marie-Lise, but she just went by Lise and I felt like that was a very classic French thing, where just everyone yeah…

Bridget: Yes, yes.

Ann: Assume Marie is the first part of everyone’s name, but you just don’t say it. But Adelaide is just Adelaide. 

Bridget: Yes. So, that’s nice for us. And as you know, I use her first name throughout the book and will defend it to the death but we don’t have to go into that, or we can. 

Ann: No, we can, I think, and we should. Because this really… Your book was, I mean, thank god, but I was reading it at the same time that I’m working on my project. You describe how you use people’s names, like, women, how— Anyway, you can explain all of this better than I could but I’m like, “I’ve never thought about this, but this is so important and so interesting.” 

Bridget: Well, I’ve written about this before. You know, it’s very complicated as a biographer, when you’re writing about a woman’s life, most women in the Western world, if they marry, change their name and we consider it a token of seriousness to use a last name. So, how do you refer to a woman character figure that you’re featuring in childhood who has one name and a different name in adulthood? Or maybe she remarries several times, or maybe her father or brother is also very famous and they have the same last name. I mean, it’s super complicated. But if you choose to use a woman’s first name, it’s considered unserious. Why is that? Because women are considered unserious. So, women’s first names aren’t given the gravitas that Napoleon has, or Dante has, or Michelangelo has. But I think they should and I think it’s kind of the only sensible way to treat a woman in many ways. And someone like Adelaide had three different names in her lifetime, actually four, and that’s how women get lost in history. You lose the track of who they are. Do first names solve that problem? Not necessarily, but at least it’s consistent. 

Ann: No, and it’s interesting because there’s… So, people like Marie Antoinette, for instance, and that wasn’t actually her name, that was the French translation of her name. But royal people don’t have a last name, so that makes it easier to know what to call them. 

Bridget: Exactly. I mean, you could call them the first, the second, the third. 

Ann: True, and that’s confusing in a different way. 

Bridget: Yeah, but we manage, you know? We manage. There are many people named Jones, there are many people named White, there are many people named whatever, right? We figure it out. 

And I just would add, in the world of art, it is a sign of your sort of honourable status in the history of art to go by your first name; Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael, Rembrandt. I mean, I could go on and on, right? And so, it makes even more sense when I’m writing about a woman artist to say, you know what, Frida (that’s a perfect example too), just use the first name. It has a tradition in the history of art and I’m going to use that tradition and that’s what I did in my book. 

Ann: And I want to say also, your book, Portrait of a Woman, very long subtitle, [laughs] it’s written very much, like, you are an art historian but the book is written very much for a person who does not have that background and also for a person who does not have the background in understanding French history, both of which is me. So, I want to let people know. 

Bridget: I mean, and that’s everyone, really. Maybe the French understand it, I mean, it’s super complicated. I want to say, I guess, I’m a writer and so I’m a storyteller and I’m an art historian. So, the most important thing for me is clarity and to convey the story. So, it’s tricky because it’s confusing, I mean, I was listening to the Madame du Barry episode and laughing because it’s so complicated and there’s nothing more complicated than the French Revolution, unless maybe it’s French art in the 18th century, very complicated. So, you’re trying to, like, feed all this information to the reader while telling the story. So, I had to be kind of selective, like, what do you need to know to understand this without going nuts and making people crazy? Actually, writing it short was difficult, like, culling and just trying to be clear. So yes, it is to be read; it’s not an art history book, it’s a story. But there’s a lot of art history and it’s about art. 

Ann: Yeah, and there’s a lot of beautiful illustrations, colour illustrations throughout the book, which I really appreciate because it explains… As an artist, she’s communicating so much stuff through symbolism and I could read you describing the symbolism but then to see the actual painting, I’m like, “Ohhh! Okay. Yeah, now I see. I see what you mean.” 

Bridget: Yeah. I mean, Chronicle Books is fantastic, they’re known for making these beautiful objects. I love them, my publisher. And I just want to say also about Adelaide that this is a case for a lot of women in history and world history, that there’s not a lot of written record from their own hand, or other people, about them necessarily. So, what’s great about having an artist is you can get at them, their personality, their lives from a different angle, a visual angle, which is communication. It’s entirely, they’re communicating through visual symbols, signs, everything. 

Ann: Well, and even just, like, the choice of, I mean, and we’re going to, we’ll talk through all this, but there’s several points in her life where the subject she chooses for a painting really communicates where we don’t have her diaries or her letters. It’s like, oh, this is what she was about. This is what she wanted people to know. Like, that was her… 

Bridget: Exactly. 

Ann: Yeah, it’s like when I was doing, a while ago, I was doing a Mary Queen of Scots series, and we don’t have a lot of diaries from her, but what we do have are her embroideries and then when you start looking at them as art objects, it’s like, oh my gosh! Like, the rage, but also the… Anyway, like, you get so much through— And that’s what I learned through, Clare Hunter wrote a really good book about Mary Queen of Scots and her embroideries. But, like, for a woman artist, a creative person where you don’t have the words, it’s like, but you can still glean so much about a person and what they wanted people to know by the objects that they created. 

Bridget: Absolutely. And I really push back on this necessary idea in biography that you have to have letters, you have to have journals, without that, you have no primary document. These are primary documents. And you know what? People lie in letters and people lie to themselves [laughs] in journal entries. So, everything has to be taken with a grain of salt. It doesn’t make it true because it was said in the letter, it makes it probable, it makes it… Also, people make mistakes. 

Anyway, there’s so much richness in visual culture and we are increasingly a visual culture ourselves. And so, it’s really fun to be able to talk about pictures but also to reclaim these lives that have been overlooked for so long, partly because women’s lives weren’t worth recording. 

Ann: And what I’m really excited to talk to you— Well, I’m excited your book exists so I could learn about this person, about Adelaide. But also, yeah, just in terms of this series I’m doing to talk about the not-royal people, the everyday, working-class people, which she very much was. 

So, can you explain Adelaide, her childhood, what her deal was? 

Bridget: Sure! I mean, I think that’s one of the most remarkable things about her life, not that she was a woman artist, there were actually thousands. Her origin story is almost unprecedented. Most women artists who became successful, really until the 20th century, in the West were the daughters of artists. And not only is she not the daughter or the sister of an artist, her father was a shopkeeper, who you have mentioned before actually in the Madame du Barry episode. Her father was Claude-Edme Labille and he ran a haberdasher shop, which is not exactly a hat shop, it’s everything; it’s, like, buttons and fabrics, all these beautiful things. And it was called À La Toilette and À La Toilette was a place where, kind of, the beautiful people could have got by beautiful bits and bats. 

Ann: This is, in the Madame du Barry episode, which I know you’ve heard, that’s why I described it as similar to Hooters, in the sense of, one of the beautiful things was he only hired very beautiful young salespeople, including Madame du Barry, the future Madame du Barry. 

Bridget: Correct, when she was Jeanne Bécu, when she was just a young, but already very beautiful young woman, Adelaide worked alongside her, we think, at À La Toilette, and they became friends, friendly at least. So, these young shop girls who were called les grisettes were kind of known for being potentially available. I mean, they’re interacting with people above their station, and in the case of Monsieur Labille, he’s choosing very much, he wants beautiful girls and beautiful things. 

So, she grows up surrounded by beauty and surrounded by aesthetic pleasure and an understanding of aesthetics. I would say even an understanding of fabrics, of the weight of things, how things shine. One of the things you’ll read about her early in assessments of her is, “Oh, as a woman, she understood how to depict a dress.” And I would say, well, maybe as a woman, but also maybe as the child of a person who made his living with fine fabrics, that’s probably more likely. So, she’s one of eight children, daughter of a shopkeeper, she’s the eighth. So, the eighth child and a girl, probably not an auspicious position, I say that as the eighth child. [laughs] 

Ann: Are you really? [laughs] 

Bridget: Yeah. But I’m eight of nine, she was eight of eight. But she grows up in Paris and she grows up in a neighbourhood near the Louvre. And the Louvre in the 18th century is actually not what we think of it today. It was not a museum, but it also wasn’t a royal residence. The residence had been moved to Versailles, two kings before, and it had become mostly a place where artists had their apartments and their studios. So, it was kind of like, if you were admitted to the Académie Royale, which from now on I’m going to call the Royal Academy, when you were admitted to the Royal Academy, you could get one of these great studios and apartments in the Louvre. So, she grows up in a neighbourhood where there are lots of artists and also, ones who don’t belong to the Academy also live in the neighbourhood around the Louvre. So, she grows up in this totally artistic milieu. 

Her mother dies when she’s 12 years old, and her siblings all die except for one or two who, one we keep track of, a couple sort of are cut loose in history. But by the time she’s a young teenager, say 14 years old, she only has one living sibling and her mother is dead. And her father, apparently, allows her to begin studying to be a miniature painter with a neighbourhood artist named François-Élie Vincent. She learns miniature painting; miniature painting was something that was sort of women were allowed to do. It was fine and small and not smelly, it uses watercolours, you know, et cetera, et cetera. 

Ann; So, I want to, yeah, I want to talk about that a bit, because you mentioned this and then later, when she works in pastels and stuff… For a woman doing art, which is like, lots of people were, you were saying, here’s thousands of women painters, but also it’s, like, to be an artist, like, in the Louvre, in those apartments, you have your canvases, you have your oil paints, like, it takes up a lot of space. But to do a miniature painting, like, you could do that in the corner of a room. So, it’s more attainable to a woman, basically. 

Bridget: It’s utterly more attainable. And it’s reasonable, like, women should know the beautiful arts; they should be able to know music, they should know how to draw, and miniature painting is, in some sense, an extension of that. But she’s studying with a real miniature painter. So, she’s already taking it up a notch. His son, François-André Vincent, decides that he is going to become a true painter of the French tradition, he wants to be a history painter, which is the highest level that you can attain in French art, and he studies with one of the greatest teachers in French art, whose last name was Vien. 

Ann: So, a history painter, that means somebody who paints famous scenes from, like, the Bible times and from ancient Rome. 

Bridget: Exactly, like those giant paintings like you think about, like, with the great names like “Rape of the Sabine Women.” You know, like, multi-figure, blood, gore, breasts hanging out, babies being impaled, you know, wild animals. They’re violent or they’re super serious, or they’re, you know, they’re filled with drama, they’re many, many figures, very large. This is the apex of French painting. Very few attain that status in French art and her teacher’s son, who was her friend, Vincent the son, does attain it. He gets to enter the studio of a famous, one of the most famous history painters in France and that’s important because they are friends. And he eventually wins, Vincent, the Prix de Rome. The Prix de Rome, it’s kind of like Top Chef or Project Runway, like, it’s a competition among students, and it’s timed, and you only have so much time to, like, whip out a painting, and then it’s judged, and the winner gets to go to Rome for four years, and study classical art in Rome, you know, from the paintings that are there, and the classical statues, to be in the world, the classical world, and study it firsthand. So, he goes away, and she’s left, she’s learned miniature painting, and her father has sold À La Toilette. 

So, what happens to her is what happens to a lot of young women, she’s married off at 19, while Vincent is in Italy. And she, I mean, looking from now, you’re kind of like, “Oh, bad choice,” but it could have been worse, for sure. Her husband was another neighbour, but he was a clerk in the Treasury of the Clergy so, like, a bureaucrat. But she has at 19, written into her marriage documents that she’s an artist, like, she has a profession. So, she has studied miniature painting professionally, and she already considers herself a professional artist, even as a teenager. She does this amazing self-portrait miniature, where she shows herself painting but when you look closely, you see she’s not painting a miniature, she’s using— Well, she is, she’s painting a miniature in the painting, but behind her are the things that are used in oil painting. So, she has these goals, and she’s telegraphed them like, “I’m going to be an oil painter. I’m going to be a Royal Academy painter,” which is crazy. Like, that doesn’t happen. Women are really not allowed in the Royal Academy. They have this sort of unofficial quota of four. 

Ann: Oh my gosh! Can you— Okay, like, you explained this in the book, but the quota of four and how that came to be is so fucked up. So yeah. 

Bridget: Well, it’s official, and then it’s unofficial. So, I mean, there’s also this whole long history with, when the Royal Academy is established in the 17th century, the King says “It’s for everyone. It’s for the greatest artists.” And basically, what begins to happen is this sense of like, “Okay, okay, we’ll let in the King’s knight’s daughter, who’s pretty good, because that’s a favourite of the King.” “Okay, we’ll let in this guy’s wife, because that’s just a collegial thing to do.” But there’s this unspoken understanding that there can never be more than four at any given time. And later, an official says, “Because four is enough to tip our hat at their sex but they don’t need more than that.”

Ann: But it’s literally like, so if there’s four women who are members, it’s like, no other women can join until one of those four people dies. 

Bridget: Well, that happens later. But yes.

Ann: Oh, so first it’s four. 

Bridget: First it’s four but it’s unspoken, it’s unspoken. But yes, you’re right, there can only be four so you have to die. So, obviously, this does not engender, like, great fellow feeling among women. [laughs] But also, why do you want to be in the Royal Academy? Because it’s everything. That is a sign that you are an important artist, a great artist, it means you can have lodging in the Louvre, it means that you can have access to state commissions. It’s the acknowledgement that you are— It’s kind of like when, you know, in all the years that I was writing before I published a book, even though I wrote full-time and I published, people would say, “Have you published a book?” Because like, if you haven’t published a book, somehow you’re not a writer, like, in people’s minds. It’s the same kind of thing but way more, way more important than that because it’s also how you get students. I mean, it’s how you make a living as an artist. So, it is an absurd goal but it is the goal. It’s like wanting to be on Broadway. What are the chances, right? But if you’re an actor, like, if you’re a musical theatre actor, that’s what you want. I don’t know. Maybe I’m not giving great examples. 

Ann: No, you’re giving good examples. Part of it too, and I’m sure we’ll get to this when we get to it, but there’s a thing that you described in your book is kind of like the Super Bowl, where every few years, all the artists in the academy display their stuff. 

Bridget: Yes. So, every two years, they have the Royal Salon and the Royal Salon is where everyone comes to look at the work of the Royal Academy artists. And you have to be in the Royal Academy to show your work in the Royal Salon so it’s like, yes exactly, it’s like being in the Oscars or making the Olympics. And everyone comes to look at the paintings and the sculptures that are in the Royal Salon every two years. And you’re written about, you’re gossiped about, that’s what makes people want to have commissions with you because you’re a painter of the Royal Academy and you show at the Royal Salon. If you don’t have that there are other salons, there are other organizations, but they don’t have the same status, it’s completely different. 

Ann: And it’s very dependent, like, if you’re in the Royal Academy, it’s like, okay, you’re an official artist but, like, you need patrons, you need people to be hiring you and you can’t just be like… You don’t just paint, like, you paint because someone has hired you to paint a certain thing. 

Bridget: Right. Most artists are not from wealth. I mean, they are well established, or they can have great connections, like someone we’re going to talk about, but they don’t come from wealth. So, to accrue wealth and status, all of those things, you need the Royal Academy. You need to be part of that, especially if you’re a woman, like Adelaide, who will soon be an independent woman. 

Ann: Yeah, because biggest spoiler: she leaves her husband, pretty soon. 

Bridget: She leaves her husband, yes, which is crazy! So, in 1769, on August 25th, she marries him. In 1774, on August 25th, she has her first exhibition at the Salon de Saint-Luc. The Academy of Saint-Luc is basically, it’s like a guild, almost anyone can join, there’s lots of women. But she has her first really official, you know, exhibition, and she is kind of emboldened by that to begin studying pastel with a Royal Academy member. Pastel is a step up from miniatures because they’re large, they can be very large but like miniatures, they don’t smell, they don’t stain, they’re portable; they still have a kind of womanly aura about them. Although, de la Tour is, you know, a master and considered a very important painter. 

Ann: In terms of pastels, like, pastels, I did not know, as a person who has not studied art history, that pastels were anything other than a thing you learn about in, like, fourth-grade art class to draw with. Because I just remember, like, they never harden, they never dry. 

Bridget: Right. That’s also a bad thing because they are very fragile. 

Ann: Yeah, so the paintings would be always— You’d have to put glass on top of them, or something, I guess. 

Bridget: Yeah, I mean, now they spray a fixative. But you know, they’re done on paper so even the great, great works of 18th century French pastel are done on these pieces of paper that are just put together, and then put under glass. One of the most exciting things for me in doing research on Adelaide was getting to see her pastels in Versailles. Like, that was amazing because you so rarely get to see pastels, they’re almost never on display. 

Ann: Because they’re so fragile. But I just didn’t know that fine artists in history used pastels. It’s like you told me it’s like, “And then she would use Crayons.” I’m like, what? 

Bridget: Exactly! Well, they did. [laughs] 

Ann: Right! No, exactly. But it seems to me, like, nowadays, it’s a thing that you do in elementary school. And there’s pictures in your book of just beautiful things that she accomplished with pastels.

Bridget: And they were considered paintings.

Ann: Yeah, they look like paintings, yeah.

Bridget: Yeah, they do, they do. And they’re gorgeous. The thing about pastel is that they have this really vibrant colour and because pastels have that powdery surface, they’re actually beautiful for portraiture because they kind of capture that fullness of human flesh. You know, like, when you see a varnish painting, it’s so slick but a pastel has that kind of almost 3D surface that skin has. So, it is a beautiful medium for portraiture and it was really invented by a woman Rosalba Carriera, who was Italian, in the 18th century, who— Rosalba is known by her first name, Rosalba. Great, great artist. But it’s taken up by the French in a big way and it also suits the Rococo because it can be very bright colours and very pretty colours. 

So, she’s studying with this really important guy and it’s right around that time that she leaves her husband. And what’s remarkable about that is, how is she going to make a living? [laughs] Like, that’s crazy, that’s nuts, you can’t do that. But she does. And we don’t know why that we have no record of why. But you can kind of imagine, first of all, she has not had a child, they’ve been married for… She leaves him in 1777 so they’ve been married for seven years when they have the official separation, and why they’ve never had a child, we don’t know but I have my suspicions. I actually looked into 18th-century birth control and abortion, and both existed. But I think it’s far more likely that they didn’t have, or it is certainly likely that they didn’t have relations or not much. So, she leaves him and she’s able to get back her dowry, which is remarkable and very unusual. 

She takes on women students almost immediately. So, she becomes an instructor of young women, this is really important, and begins a professional career as a woman artist, which is dangerous for a lot of reasons. Women aren’t supposed to be professional artists, it’s kind of like being an actress, like, you don’t put yourself out there, and you certainly don’t do it if you don’t have a man protecting your modesty and your everything, right? So, she’s immediately in this very morally tenuous position. And the same year that she has the official separation, she shows at a new salon, that is part of this, like, brand new thing called the Salon de la Correspondence, and it’s run by this bigger-than-life, kind of, P.T. Barnum guy, who shows art and shows taxidermied armadillos, I don’t know, whatever, like wild things all together, like a cabinet of curiosities. And at the Salon de Correspondence in 1777, he shows Adelaide Labille-Guiard and another woman artist who’s becoming very renowned named Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun. And Élisabeth is the artist of the 18th century that, if anyone knows the name of a woman artist from the 18th century, that’s usually who they know. If you were to see reproductions of her work, like in my book or other places, you would recognize them. Like, you’re like, “Oh! I didn’t know that was her.” 

Ann: Yeah, listeners to this podcast, if you look right now at your podcast listening app, the picture for this season is my face done up as a portrait of Marie Antoinette by Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun. 

Bridget: That’s right, that’s right!

Ann: So, you are familiar with that, even if you don’t know that you are. 

Bridget: Exactly, and that was a very famous painting. That’s a whole ‘nother story [laughs] and a very interesting story. 

So, Élisabeth is younger than Adelaide, notably, widely acclaimed to be beautiful and said many times, much more beautiful than Adelaide. And she is the toast of Paris, she’s a fashionista who changes the face of fashion in France and everywhere. She becomes close friends with Marie Antoinette and is eventually the official portraitist or official painter to Marie Antoinette. So, she’s a friend of the queen, she’s gorgeous, and she is kind of a child prodigy or had been and is quite young. She’s married to a picture dealer and he promotes her work widely because he has a gambling problem and he’s using all of her money. And when this P.T. Barnum sets them up, he’s a master of PR and he says, “Oh! By chance, two women artists have been put together on the walls of the Salon de Correspondence,” which of course he did himself, and he sets up a rivalry between them that exists to this day. You will see things written about it all the time. 

So, as Adelaide is kind of beginning to make a public life for herself as an artist and needs the money, this much younger, more beautiful, connected-to-royalty person is put up as, like, who she has to be put against. This is something we see today all the time in sports and music. You know, women are made to have a catfight, kind of, in public, even though they have no desire for it. 

Ann: Yeah. No, I think it’s something, like, there’s something… it’s so… not elemental but it’s just such a recurring… I’m just thinking when I was younger, it’s like Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera debuted the same year and it was just like, “Well, which one is better? Who do you prefer?” It’s like, well, what? Can’t you like both? And now there’s, like, Sabrina Carpenter or Chappell Roan, it’s like… 

Bridget: Exactly! 

Ann: Yeah. It’s like two women who emerge and it’s like, well, there can’t be two talented women so which one is better?

Bridget: Right, because what do they have in common? What do Beyoncé and Taylor Swift have in common? They’re both successful women artists. [laughs] That’s it. They exist at the same time. And this is the thing I kind of harp on in the book, there’s this idea of the exceptional woman; There can only be one exceptional woman of any given era. One! Because the exceptional woman proves the rule and it’s not too many because one is sufficient to give honour to their sex. 

So, they’re put up against each other and honestly, the self-portrait that Élisabeth shows is, like, stunning. I mean, it’s such an amazing oil painting, it hangs in the National Gallery in London, it’s very famous, I mean, it’s an incredible painting. And it’s super, not just accomplished, it’s super, like, she’s aiming as high as she can; she’s basing the painting on something by Peter Paul Rubens. It’s super ambitious. And that’s the kind of, like, women aren’t supposed to be ambitious, they’re not supposed to show ambition, that’s like not cool. And Adelaide, what is shown of her self-portrait, is just a very straightforward pastel self-portrait that really is an advertisement of, like, looking for commissions like, “Look, I can do a feather. I can do glinting earring. I can do all of these things.” But it doesn’t kind of, like, there’s not much wow factor to it. So, I can imagine leaving that and being like, “Oh, that didn’t feel good.” Like, you have a bad picture in the yearbook and your rival has, like, had hair and makeup done by someone professional and her parents paid to have a great picture taken. It would feel like that, you can imagine. 

But Adelaide learns a lot from that, and she comes back and does a series of pastels of men of the Royal Academy that are incredible. So, you know, Élisabeth does this painting where she sort of allies herself with one of the great masters of the past, Rubens, big, big deal, and Adelaide comes back and shows a series of pastels of men in her neighbourhood who are members of the Royal Academy. So, presumably her friends and their beautiful portraits. But it’s so smart, right? She’s like, “I know!” Because you know, to do someone’s portrait, someone has to sit in front of you for several hours while you talk to them. So, you can let them know your ambition. I mean, you’re subtle, of course, but your ambition, you’re friendly, you’re, you know, you’re a good person, you’re fun, you’re one of the guys, whatever it is. But also, they watch you work, they know you can do it and that’s important because women are always being accused of not doing their work themselves. So, all these important men of the Royal Academy see her work and she gets to know them. So, in 1783, there are two openings suddenly for women in the Royal Academy. 

Ann: Because two women died, two of the four died. 

Bridget: Two women died! Yes. Two women die. But there’s no rule that you have to fill them. The four is, like, there are many times there’s one or none, like, you don’t have to fill it, but there are these two openings. 

Ann: Two openings! 

Bridget: Two openings. What are the chances, they don’t want women anyway, that they’re going to put two women in? Extremely low. You know, extremely low. So, you know, if I was Adelaide, I would not get my hopes up but in May of 1783, both women are admitted on the same day, which furthers their rivalry, as you might imagine. What is remarkable is they’re both admitted, even though neither is connected to the Royal Academy; they don’t have a husband in the Royal Academy, they don’t have any reason except for excellence to be admitted. 

Well, Élisabeth is admitted, when you look at the Academy minutes, by order, par ordre, and that order came from Marie Antoinette and the King. She’s the Queen’s favourite, and the Queen wants her favourite in the Royal Academy, that reflects well on the Queen. And I mean, my interpretation and many people’s interpretation of Adelaide being admitted on the same day is them saying, “Oh okay, if you’re going to make us men, woman, Marie Antoinette, who we don’t like anyway, you’re going to make us admit a woman, we’ll come back with our own woman, who is her rival.” It’s a little “F you” to them, and they admit Adelaide and the minutes say, les voix prises a l’ordinaire, “the votes taken in the usual manner.” So, it’s a little bit of a slap in the face. And Adelaide signs herself into the Royal Academy books as a member with a new name, and that name is Adelaide des Vertus, Adelaide of the Virtues, like, I’m a virtuous woman, and I have virtues. 

Okay, all of this now backstory, or maybe it’s forward story is that Adelaide will die, what I think is young, in her early fifties, and Élisabeth will live into her eighties, and she’s also younger than Adelaide. She will publish in the 19th century, a multi-volume memoir that is a best-seller where she tells the whole story of her life and she has a second wind of celebrity in the 19th century. And she very cleverly writes Adelaide out of the story. So, there is no other person who’s admitted that day when you read the chapter on her admission. She never says that there’s another woman who’s admitted, she never mentioned this ever in this multi-volume memoir, the name of the woman who was always her greatest rival. So, it’s another way that Adelaide was kind of erased from history after death. And for some reason, maybe as a writer, I find that really sad and horrible. 

I guess, just to say, that there’s there is a Royal Salon just a few months after they’re admitted so they both get to show work but they can’t make new work, right? Because it’s, like, it’s too soon so they have to use the work that they have and they show works. Adelaide’s are actually received quite well, the Getty just acquired one of those pastels; it went for I think six or seven times over the asking price. So, Adelaide’s trajectory is going up for sure.

But at the salon of 1783, Adelaide is accused in a libelous pamphlet of sleeping with her friend Vincent. And there’s this famous line where… So, Vincent, “Vincent” in French, sounds like 2,000, Vincent is the same as 2,000. His name sounds like 2,000. So, there was this sort of line and it said, “Vincent or 2,000, whoever she’s sleeping with, it’s the same thing.” In other words, “She’s a slut. She’s sleeping around and Vincent, her friend, is doing the paintings.” So, it’s the most common accusation that happens to women, but it’s devastating to Adelaide and it’s very dangerous because she is a single woman. Like, her morality can’t be attacked that way and she doesn’t really have anyone to defend her and she’s able to get the pamphlets pulled. But I mean, I can quote from them, like, they’re famous. Once something’s written and out there, it’s out there. 

But her famous comeback to everything is at the next salon, which is two years later, 1785, she debuts this monumental self portrait, like, bigger than life size of herself and two of her students. It’s in the Metropolitan Museum of Art now and it’s one of their most, kind of, prized 18th century works. It wasn’t for a long time, but now it is considered, like, one of the great works of 18th century French art. So, it’s her with two of her pupils. Right after she and Élisabeth were admitted to the Royal Academy, they took that quota, that unofficial quota of four and went to the king and said, “Okay, enough is enough. We can’t be having all these women coming in, it will disrupt the friendship among all of these male artists,” because you know how it is once women enter the scene. 

Ann: I’ve just pictured this like, bros, this kind of, like, fraternity vibe. Well, because the whole thing is like, once you’re admitted, you can have apartments. And they’re like, “But then we can’t have her like bro time, if there’s like a lady in our dormitories.” 

Bridget: Exactly! Can’t have bro time, even though their wives live there, their children live there and female models come and go. [laughs] Yeah, so you are saying one of the things that happened was that Adelaide tried to get her apartment in the Louvre and they told her “No, because you have women students and it’s not good for their morals to be where there are so many men around,” even though your wives are there, your kids are there, your models are there. 

Ann: But didn’t she also, like, she was always very dedicated to training women and having female students. And so, like, she could have been like, “Okay, I’ll stop having female students.” But instead, she’s like, “Okay, well, fuck you. I just won’t live in the Louvre then. I’m going to keep women.” 

Bridget: Yeah, totally. And this is like a little side story. Okay, back up for a second and say, the king’s like, “Okay, okay, fine. Here’s a law. The quota is official, the cap is four and that’s how many there can be, there doesn’t have to be four,” it’s like laid out, “And the vote has to be unanimous to allow women in, it has to unanimous. Someone has to die, there can be no more than four, there can be one, there can be zero.” It’s laid out and it goes against the founding documents really of the Royal Academy. So, that’s very bad. If you’re a teacher of women students, right? Because it’s like saying to your students, “Sorry!”

Ann: They can never… “Until I die, you can’t…”

Bridget: Yeah! Oh, gosh, I didn’t even think about that, like, assassin. There might be a murder story in there. So, she’s basically teaching these young women to have these high ideals for art, but saying “I can have it, but you can’t, sorry.” Like, that feels bad and is bad, it’s bad for business. So, she debuts this, I mean, it’s a huge painting of her painting with two of her students behind her and she has this little smile on her face and basically, she’s put two more women artists hanging on the walls of the Royal Salon by putting her artist students there. It’s like a little “F you” to the Royal Academy, like, “Huh, well, you don’t want any more women than the Royal Academy? Well, here they are, on your walls.” 

Ann: And the painting, you keep saying it’s huge, I think in your book, you say it’s, like, seven feet tall or something. It’s, like, gigantic. So, it’s like, her: huge. The students: huge. Like, bigger than life size. 

Bridget: Yeah, right. Like, “I’m an important artist and so are they.” They also stand behind her in the place where you would normally see a muse for a male artist. So, it’s almost like “These are my muses, this is who matters to me, this is my divinity. This is what matters.” And one of those women has lived with her already for years and will live with her till the end of her life. Marie-Gabrielle Capet, who is a very accomplished painter. So, I just think it’s so funny that— Also, she’s wearing this voluminous blue dress that’s super low cut and she’s got a big feathered hat. I mean, it’s like, “I’m fabulous and I’m painting.” And there’s a little bit of like, she just wants it all and says, take it or leave it. Like, it’s not… Women are not supposed to show off, they’re not supposed to be ambitious, they’re not supposed to be a giant self portrait of themselves in the Royal Salon. Like, you’re not supposed to do that but she does it anyway. And I love that. I love it. And that’s really her.

Ann: No, exactly. And you talk about that painting a lot in the book and I’m really glad you do, and you sort of, like, zero in on different parts of it. But, like, just to emphasize for people who have not seen the painting, it’s like she’s sitting there in this gorgeous dress next to the canvas. She’s wearing, like, a straw hat. It’s preposterous because she’s indoors and she’s painting. You would never paint indoors in this huge hat, in this, like, very fancy dress, and she’s looking right at the viewer.

Bridget: Right at you. Like, when you’re looking at it, she’s looking at you. 

Ann: Yeah. And she’s kind of sitting and she’s just like, “And what?” [chuckles]

Bridget: You know that line like “Living well is the best revenge,” it feels a little like that. Like, it’s a little bit just like, “Fuck you, dudes.” 

Ann: Yeah. No, exactly. It’s like, we don’t have her letters, we don’t have her diaries, but we have this painting where it’s like, this is her response to all of this. And it’s like, okay, I see what she’s about. I see what she’s saying. Yeah. 

Bridget: And it’s dangerous. Like, the last one she had these attacks on her morals and she’s just… [laughs] And she effectively has no husband. Divorce is not legal, it’s a Catholic country so she’s not divorced, but she’s a single woman. And it’s yeah, it’s just this great bravura painting and it catches the eye of the royal family, not the current, ruling royal family, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. But Louis XVI’s aunts see that painting and they want to buy it, they love it, and Adelaide refuses to give it up. 

Ann: Oh yeah, she never sells that painting. 

Bridget: Yeah, she never sells it, which is crazy! She needs money and the princesses of France want to buy it. And she says, “No, but I’ll paint you portraits, “and she does three portraits of the king’s aunts, one posthumous, two living, and they are incredible. 

Ann: Oh no, they are. And I just want to mention for the listeners, those are, we talked about them in the Madame du Barry episode, those are the Mesdames. They were the ones who were, like, so bitchy to Marie Antoinette…

Bridget: Yeah, they hate Marie Antoinette. 

Ann: They were, like, spinster aunts who were just kind of, like, living together and just being these terrible bitches, and then they’re like, “You know what? She’s a bitch too. Great. Like, let’s get her to paint us. Great.” 

Bridget: Yeah. It’s awesome. It’s awesome. And then what’s shocking is that one of them who’s, very confusing, her name is also Adelaide—so she’s Madame Adelaide, as opposed to painter Adelaide—at the next Royal Salon, our Adelaide shows an even bigger painting depicting the Princess Adelaide as a painter, as an artist. She’s standing in a royal gown in this incredibly opulent setting, red royal gown, and she’s holding a crayon basically, and standing before medallion portraits of her parents. It’s really a pointed way of saying “The ancien regime was just and true, they were the love of my life.” Above her head is a frieze showing her and her sister rushing in to help their father when he has smallpox because they’re so brave and such virtuous women. They are also unmarried women, interestingly. And I mean, why would a princess want to be depicted as an artist? Artists aren’t, you know, not the best thing. It would be, maybe, the other way. But it’s a painting that has a lot in common with the self-portrait. Many aspects of it are like the self-portrait. So, Princess Adelaide really liked that painting and wanted a similar one for herself and she is also depicted as an artist. 

It debuts at the Salon of 1787 at the same time that Élisabeth shows a portrait of Marie Antoinette that is also similar. So, maybe Madame Adelaide, someone saw the painting of Marie Antoinette because they’re both wearing red, red gowns. They’re clearly in response to each other. 

Ann: Well, and we know that, like, Princess Adelaide and her sisters hated Marie Antoinette. So, they’re just like, “Oh, your painter is doing you like this. Well, my painter is going to do me like this and even better.” 

Bridget: Exactly. That’s the whole point, that’s the whole point. And Marie Antoinette is shown surrounded by her children, the future of France, like, “These are my jewels. This is the future of France.” And Madame Adelaide is basically saying, “Fuck you and your kids. France’s past is its glory. What I’ve depicted from my own body, my hand, I have depicted France’s more noble past.” 

Unfortunately for Marie Antoinette and Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, when the painting of Marie Antoinette is shown next to Princess Adelaide, it was widely known to be very, very, very expensive, Marie Antoinette paid top dollar. She was considered too expensive. And it also, this is kind of crazy, shows the cabinet where that infamous necklace was supposedly kept.

Ann: [gasps] The necklace! I’ve done a whole episode about the necklace. So, the painting contains the cabinet… So, this is when everyone is hating Marie Antoinette because the whole necklace situation anyway. Yeah. 

Bridget: They hate her. And so, it shows, like, she’s trying to show the jewels that are coming from her body. It’s a response saying, “It’s not about diamondy jewels, it’s about the jewels I’ve created for the state. It’s me as a loving mother.” And, you know, she just was clueless in many ways. Like, it’s a very sad painting; there’s an empty cradle, she’s lost a baby. Like, it is, if anything, a very sad painting, and tender, of a mother with her children. Élisabeth was a fantastic painter, but it is immediately, as soon as it’s I think, brought into the salon, people begin yelling, “Voilà, le deficit.” There’s the deficit. 

Ann: “We’re all starving and she paid all this money to, like, have a painting of herself.” 

Bridget: Yeah, for this painting, and she’s wearing the super expensive gown, and she’s showing off her jewels, and we know where the real jewels are in this painting. You know, it’s a deliberate propaganda piece that they’re put up against each other. Again, it’s like, the royal women are set up against each other—I mean, Versailles is notoriously that way anyway, and especially those two [laughs] hated each other—and they’re the painters who paint them are also put up against each other. In this case, I would say, in the court of public opinion, Adelaide kind of wins. 

I mean, she’s on a kind of a high, right? Like, she got admitted to the Royal Academy at the same time as Élisabeth, she’s now a member of the Royal Academy, she’s not allowed to have lodgings in the Louvre. Élisabeth, it seems, never asked for them. She lived in, like, a very beautiful kind of townhouse, I guess you’d say with her husband and was wealthy. I mean, things are going well. Part of the reception of that painting leads to their brother, the Mesdames brother, the Comte de Provence, also commissioning a painting from Adelaide, a history painting. He wants a multi-figure, massive painting of him being a knight of, I think, Saint-Lazare. It’s not a real knighthood. It’s like the Knights of Columbus. [laughs] 

Ann: So, this is the biggest commission. Yeah, like, a history painting from commissioned by a member of the royal family. 

Bridget: It couldn’t be bigger. It’s going to mean that she has now reached the highest level of French art, a place that she was admitted as a portraitist. Portraiture is the highest level allowed for women in, sort of, the French Royal Academy. And now she will be a history painter, painting for the, yeah, for the royal family, for the king’s brother. I’m sorry, he’s the king’s brother, not the Mesdames brother. So, it’s huge. And she’s thrilled, but you’re paid on delivery but she’s going to make 30,000 livres, which is a life-changing sum for her. And so, she stops everything to work on this painting. She has to rent a bigger studio because she needs room for this gigantic canvas, she travels all over to do portraits of the individuals who are going to be in the painting, and she sinks all of her own money into this, to work on this painting, which is, it’s her life’s ambition is this work and it’s going to cement her reputation in the world of French art. 

And I just want to just, side glancing to the side. The commission is huge, also, she’s now become part of… One of the important artists, people visit her studio. So, you know, the grand tour is already kind of in action and people are going and visiting, you know, famous artists in their studios and Maria Cosway who, if you’ve ever seen Jefferson in Paris, she appears in that movie. She’s a British painter who was the lover, we think, of Thomas Jefferson when he was the ambassador of France in Paris. She goes and visits, Jefferson does not, but strangely, Jefferson ends up buying the most expensive artwork he buys in all of his time in Paris when he bought a lot of expensive things was by Adelaide Labille-Guiard. And whatever that work was, we don’t know where it is or what it is. So, someone spoke in his ear and told him about this incredible artist. I mean, he would have known her work, but that her work was of value. So, another artist, Maria Cosway, his lover, we think, says, “This is someone to look at,” and he pays a lot of money for this work and we still don’t know where it is. So, that’s an exciting Easter egg or I don’t know what you call it, treasure hunt. 

Ann: No, that’s interesting because I did an episode about Sally Hemmings, who was involved with Thomas Jefferson. And so, I know from that, that Thomas Jefferson was very fastidious about writing down everything, every penny he ever spent on anything, anything he ever did. 

Bridget: That’s how we know it was the most expensive but we don’t know where it is, we don’t know what it was. But it was commissioned so… We don’t know. 

Ann: Just as an Easter egg off of your Easter egg for the listeners. So, Maria Cosway and her husband was an artist as well, right? Richard Cosway? 

Bridget: Yes, he was a miniaturist, Richard Cosway. He was annoying. [laughs]

Ann: Yes! Tell people who he painted miniatures for. 

Bridget: He painted for… Oh my gosh, I don’t know anything about the British royals, I’m so sorry. You go, now you go! 

Ann: Oh no, no, no, so I can do this. He was the private portrait painter to, the Prince of Wales, later George IV, AKA Prinny, who is the husband of Caroline of Brunswick, who I’m writing the book about. 

Bridget: Oh yes, exciting! 

Ann: And Prinny keeps, like, rickrolling his way into every episode of this season. I’m just, like, “God damn Prinny.” When I was reading your book and you were like, “He was the private portrait artist to the Prince of Wales.” I’m like, “Wait, what year is this? Wait, what Prince of Wales? God damn, it’s Prinny!” 

Bridget: Exactly. 

Ann: Yeah, so Prinny, mark off your bingo cards, Prinny is in the story, tangentially, as well. 

Bridget: Oh, it’s tangential, but it’s kind of important. But that’s, like, too much of a digression. Read the book, you guys, it’s super interesting. 

Ann: Prinny’s in the book. 

Bridget: Yeah, and I’m kind of obsessed with Maria Cosway now, especially because I did a deep dive into her once I realized she had gone to the studio and I was like, “Oh! What an interesting life.” Okay, that’s something else. And Jefferson was a little bit of a digression too. 

Ann: French Revolution is happening. So, Adelaide, you said…

Bridget: Okay, this is going to be the two minutes…

Ann: We can go over. [Bridget laughs] But she’s thriving, her career is at this apex. It’s amazing. 

Bridget: Huge!

Ann: She got this commission. Everything is great, the royal family is supporting her. And it’s just kind of the worst possible time to be supported by the royal family with money due on completion of a painting because the French Revolution happens and the royal family is… flees.

Bridget: So, she gets the commission in 1788 and in 1789, fall of the Bastille, all the stuff happens. Okay, just quickly. Follow the best deal. Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun goes, “This is bad. I’m getting out of here,” and she literally gets on the first coach she can, it takes till October, and leaves with her daughter, thus cementing her reputation forever because she then travels around Europe and paints all the people fleeing the Revolution, the nobility, all across Europe. And so, she just becomes more and more famous. She goes to Italy, she goes to the Holy Roman Empire, she goes to Russia, she eventually goes to Britain. She just travels around painting important people and becomes super famous, even more famous than before. 

Adelaide, kind of like Madame du Barry, who you’re like, “Dude, stay in England, what’s wrong with you?” [laughs] So, Élisabeth is super smart. Adelaide believes in the Revolution, she is a shopkeeper’s daughter. She holds these two totally bizarre truths although it happened in the early years of the Revolution, including the king. If you’ll remember the Declaration of the Rights of Man was something that the king reluctantly supported, which was that he would basically be a constitutional monarchy. So, she’s part of that first wave of the Revolution; she believes in the Revolution, she believes in its goals, its ideals, and she wants her history painting, she wants the money, and she wants the accolades, and she wants the fame. And it’s not super dangerous yet, 1789, to be painting the king’s brother. It’s not super dangerous until the Comte de Provence actually flees France and he gets away, and then later the king flees and does not get away. Those are bad, and yet, what does she do? She keeps working on the painting because she’s amb— Well, she doesn’t renounce the painting. She’s probably not actively working on it, but she plans for it to work out. 

I mean, her hope is that the Comte de Provence will come back, that this is all going to get solved and she will have created this incredible work for him and now, there’ll be a new kind of constitutional monarchy and she will be a painter to those royals. It’s kind of crazy hope, honestly, especially as things begin to devolve, quickly.

Ann: But also, I think like we’re just, this episode and the previous episode, which you won’t have heard yet, but we’re talking about, like, the French Revolution happens and no one knew what it was going to turn into and what it was going to be like. 

Bridget: And it quickly changes. 

Ann: And it reminds me, like, the people who were there, they’re like, “Okay, the French Revolution is happening, but I still have to keep running my fruit and vegetable stand.” Like, people who are there who have jobs, it reminds me— I talked about this in the episode I just recorded that is coming up before this one, but it’s like in the early days of, like, in 2020 when the pandemic started and restaurants were like, “We need to stay afloat. I guess we’ll do delivery. We’ll sell our bags of flour to people.” People were just like, “How can I keep my business running?” And the French Revolution was the same, it’s like, everyone can’t flee. There’s people who have jobs and they have to keep people buying their products. 

Bridget: Where would someone like Adelaide have gone? Yeah, she can’t go… She has nowhere. Her family’s from Paris. Yeah, exactly, exactly. 

Ann: So, what else is she going to do but stay there and keep painting and kind of hope for the best? 

Bridget: And she has incredible status. I guess I kind of also think about it like in Ukraine, like, there are people just, they’re just living their lives. It’s like, things are happening, they’ve got to go on. 

But she does another pretty stupid thing in the sense of stupid in the sense of, like, endangering yourself, and that is she uses the opportunity of the Revolution to speak at the assembly of the Royal Academy. Women are not supposed to speak in public, that’s not a thing in Western history, like, women speaking is bad, that means you’re even worse than showing self-portraits of yourself. Not only does she speak at the assembly, but she says if this Revolution is based on égalité, then it is not fair that women are kept from these ranks because that’s what égalité is. And she speaks so persuasively that it passes, they overturn the restriction on women. So now, theoretically, there is no more quota on women allowed in the French Academy. 

So, she’s done two things; she’s opened a pathway for women artists in France, and she’s made sure that her own students, that her legacy, can grow in French art. She’s so smart while being a little bit foolish in terms of putting herself forward in a very dangerous time. Because one of the people who doesn’t like this at all is Jacques-Louis David, who is probably the most important 18th century French painter, and who becomes the great propagandist of the French Revolution and he becomes the painter, really, and right-hand man of Robespierre during the Terror in 1793. So, she’s playing a very dangerous game. David calls her out in the assembly, he calls her out to the National Assembly, the governing body, and says, like, “There’s a hen in the cockhouse,” or something like that, like, “There can’t be a cock in the…” I can’t remember. He has some, like, weird turn of phrase. 

Ann: Yeah, a chicken-based metaphor.

Bridget: Yeah, a chicken-based… “This bitch is causing trouble, and that’s what women do, and we cannot allow this.” And that will have— Well, it’s very dangerous for her, especially as Robespierre comes to power and as the Terror begins. But it’s also very dangerous in terms of women’s legacy in France, because there will be a lasting repercussion to that. She and Vincent, who are close friends and have been friends this whole time, and he is the rival of David, and he was also a royal painter in the court. So, they’re both, like, in a bad position. 

They move to a suburb just outside of Paris, which was very smart. Some of her students come with her, his brother and his wife come with Vincent, and they just try and lay low outside of Paris during the Terror, which is very smart. During that time, of course, the king is executed, later the queen is executed, 1793. But also in 1793, the Revolution assembly says, “Hey, you know what? Adelaide really does deserve to have lodgings in the Louvre. That would really be the right thing,” and they legalize divorce. So, in the middle of all this horrible stuff, she suddenly gets her divorce, and she gets lodgings in the Louvre. Woo! So, it’s pretty hopeful. It’s pretty good. She’s really hopeful. And then they say, “You need to bring every single piece of any drawing, sketch, portrait, modello,” which is, like, an oil first-version, “of that history painting, turn it over and we’re going to burn it in a public square.” 

Ann: Because the painting contained images of enemies of the Revolution, is that why? 

Bridget: Yes. [chuckles] Yes. I mean, so do a lot of paintings that survived. So, it’s hard to say. She is an enemy and living with the enemy of David. One of the people who chooses the work is Élisabeth’s estranged husband who stays back in France. So, it’s all of those things. But definitely, the Comte de Provence is living abroad and he would be the king if he came back so he’s enemy number one. And the thing about him living abroad that’s very bad is he could be assembling armies against France, the enemies of France against France. So yeah, he’s the worst possible person she could be painting. And there’s, like, a bonfire of art in a Paris square, people are cheering and singing and a work, something like seven years of her work and all of her money is gone in flames. And her hope, like, this was her one chance. Someone at a reading said to me, “Yeah, it would be like if you finished your book and then they burned it and there was no…” 

Ann: And it was never published. 

Bridget: Never published and there was no trace of it. And I was like, “Oh my god!” Like, I thought I understood how awful it was. And when she said that, I was like, “Oh my god, that would be… How do you survive that? How do you?” She basically doesn’t. She never recovers and her health precipitously goes downhill. 

Ann: But having gotten the divorce, she does marry Vincent later in life.

Bridget: Yes, well, that’s interesting. She gets the divorce in 1793 because that’s when it’s legalized. So, that’s what I always understood and what was implied in the past when I would do research on Adelaide. But in preparing this book, I was like, “Wait a second, divorce is 1793. Why does she wait until 1800 to marry Vincent? Why?” And so, I saw some people said, “Well, she wanted to wait until her husband died.” Her ex-husband because she was Catholic and then… 

Ann: Right, right. 

Bridget: You know? But then you wouldn’t get divorced. And if she is having an affair with Vincent, that doesn’t matter. And most importantly, Vincent’s Protestant, she can’t marry him in the church anyway. So, none of those things make sense. What makes sense to me is that she’s lived with another woman for a decade or longer, she continues to live with her. When the Revolution is over, she moves into her lodgings in the Louvre, she moves out of the house outside of Paris with Vincent, she moves in with her friend, Marie-Gabrielle Capet, her “friend.” They live in lodgings in the Louvre, Vincent moves back to his lodgings in the Louvre, and they only end up moving in together when everyone is pushed out of the Louvre. Napoleon decides, “Hey, I’m going to make this into a state museum and everyone needs to go to the Institut de France.” And when Napoleon creates the Institut de France and eliminates the Royal Academy, women are no longer allowed, completely. Complete ban on women. So now, she has nowhere to go, she has no legacy, and she has no status left. 

Ann: Wait, I’m going to make a guess, and I’ll see if this is where you’re headed. Was this new place where Vincent was, were people allowed to have their wives living with them there?

Bridget: Yes. 

Ann: Okay, okay. 

Bridget: So, that’s one reason why they get married. When they get married and move into the Institut de France, she and Marie-Gabrielle Capet have their own apartment that is connected by a staircase to Vincent’s apartment. So, they don’t live together exactly. So, my theory is, of course, that Marie-Gabrielle Capet and Adelaide are lovers and that Vincent is also gay, I have reasons that I believe that to be true. I just want to say that I do think they all loved each other, I think they really were a chosen family; there is so much affection in their portraits. But also, Adelaide is very sick and probably knows she’s dying. What will happen to Gabrielle when Adelaide dies? Where will she go? She can’t inherit anything from Adelaide, she has no legal status, she’s a single woman living alone in Paris. So, by marrying Vincent, it allows Gabrielle to remain in the apartments with him because it’s not improper, it allows her to basically inherit Adelaide’s things and her art, and it allows her to basically continue to work as an artist because she can work alongside Vincent in his studio. And she does, she has a career after Adelaide dies in 1803. 

It’s such a sad story! But it’s also a really beautiful story; they supported each other, they had respect for each other. Élisabeth comes back to France and she’s had to divorce her husband, they are estranged. she’s estranged from her daughter who, there’s all these sweet, sweet paintings of her with her little daughter that you often see in Mother’s Day cards. Well, she makes a marriage that Élisabeth doesn’t like and dies alone of syphilis. And her mother abandons her because she made a bad choice and she lives the rest of her life celebrated and alone. What’s better? I don’t know. 

Ann: Yeah. The way that their lives… Well, they were set up as these rivals, which they kind of were, but also just, like, how their lives were so different even to the end is really interesting. 

Bridget: To the end, to the end. And I mean, and Élisabeth lives a long, long life and makes so much work. And I really need to stress that she is not the villain of the story. She was smart. Élisabeth was smart, she did what she needed to do to survive, to succeed, all of those things. It’s fine. 

Ann: No, exactly. It’s a Taylor Swift, Beyoncé situation. You don’t have to choose one, you don’t have to vilify the other. 

Bridget: Correct. 

Ann: Both are excellent in different ways. 

Bridget: Correct. And Adelaide deserves the recognition that Élisabeth has. [laughs]

Ann: Yes, yes. So, at the end of my episodes, I wrap things up with this— I think we’re going to get into some discussion. One of the categories is going to be Significance, but not the first one. But we need to score Adelaide on the four-point scale, the Fredegund Memorial Scandaliciousness Scale, which is interesting actually. So, it’s called that because Fredegund and Brunhild were famous queens before France was France and they’re also often set up against each other. It’s like, “Well, there can’t be two great queens.” [laughs]

Bridget: Obviously. 

Ann: So, it’s similar, it’s like, wow, France just really keeps setting women up against each other. And I keep doing episodes about the less famous one first. 

Bridget: That’s how it should be because we like an underdog. 

Ann: Exactly, exactly! That’s part of the Adelaide thing where I find her so sympathetic, it’s because Élisabeth had struggles too, obviously, but Adelaide was, like, shop girl, like, divorced. She made those connections through her talent, she didn’t have them already. 

Bridget: Yes! Her talent and her talent for friendship. Everything that comes to her, comes from being a good friend and I find that really beautiful. And her support for other women, I find really beautiful. It doesn’t mean she’s not supporting herself, man, she’s looking out for herself, for sure. 

Ann: And that portrait where she’s just like, “Fuck you,” is amazing. [Bridget laughs] 

So, the first category is Scandaliciousness, this is all on a 0 to 10 scale. And this is how scandalous she’s seen by the society in which she lived. And I think, I’ll just say a couple of things first from what I’ve learned from your book and from what you’ve said. So, I think the fact that she wanted to be an artist was seen as like, “Oh, women shouldn’t be like that,” that’s scandalous. A woman artist, like you said, they were seen as being sexually promiscuous and all those things; and then the fact that she left her husband, I would presume was seen as scandalous; that she wanted to join the academy, that I’ll be like, they’d find that scandalous. Although, I don’t think, personally, anything she did was scandalous but people saw it as such.

Bridget: I find it hard to rate because I think for us, she’s almost not scandalous at all but for her time…

Ann: Yeah. But within the context of the society she lived in, people saw her… I don’t think she was— But that’s the thing, she wasn’t intentionally trying to scandalize people. There’s been people I’ve talked about on the podcast before who enjoyed provoking… 

Bridget: No, and she’s also not savvy the way that Élisabeth is in sort of, like, self-promotion, like, that kind of thing. She just wants what she wants and she’s going to do it anyway. It’s kind of like that. To me, as a woman, what makes her the most scandalous is she did what the fuck she wanted. That is amazing.

Ann: Yeah, I feel like the seven-foot-tall portrait of her being like, “Fuck you. I look amazing. These are my students. I’m going to get some amazing commissions.” I feel like that would… 

Bridget: Yes. So, I think in her time, I mean, she’s also living in a time of high scandal. [laughs]

Ann: True, true.

Bridget: So, I think she’s scandalous. There are many things about her scandals and in a time of great scandal. So, I had a really hard time scoring this, I’ll be honest. I think for us, not so scandalous, but I would think the things she did in terms of what a woman of her time did, a 9. 

Ann: Okay. Yeah, and it’s such an interesting… Exactly. It’s tricky because it’s like, oh yes, some of the things she did were scandalous, but then the royal family was like, “I like this vibe. We’re going to get you supporters.” But then it’s like, but the royal family themselves were scandalous. So… 

Bridget: Right! And when you think about the crazy sexual adventures that are happening, the crazy… I mean, it’s a time of great scandal where people love scandal. I mean, there was as much, kind of, written and… Big cartoons start at this time. The idea of conveying these exciting, yeah, juicy stories of what’s happening, it’s an exciting time. So, in her time, I think as a woman of her time, or maybe a woman of any time, she’s scandalous in that she does what she wants the way she wants to, the way she can and wants to. But in terms of her being, like, one of the great scandals of the 18th century, not really just because there were a lot. [laughs]

Ann: [laughs] And we’ll get to those in later episodes. 

So, Schemieness, and this is qualified as like, so it’s not just like, “Ha-ha, a scheme!” But it’s sort of like, that she’s able to come up with a plan. I feel like Élisabeth, not that this is a show, I think Élisabeth was scheming more. I think Adelaide was more just like, “I just want to do my paintings!” 

Bridget: Except that she’s very… I mean, what I could never kind of let go of is how she’s so smart and so dumb at the same time. She’s so savvy, which I consider kind of scheming. “Oh, I can’t compete with Élisabeth in terms of looks, but I’m going to paint six portraits of some of the most important artists of the Royal Academy.” That’s scheming, like, “I’m going to make this happen.” She does the same thing when the Revolution happens, a super dangerous time, she does the exact same thing, and she writes to Robespierre and it was like, “Oh, I’ve done these portraits of infamous important people. I would love to do your portrait.” And he writes back and he’s like, “Oh, I’m so flattered, madame. I would love to have my portrait done.” She does his portrait, and she does a bunch of portraits of men of the National Assembly who have power of life and death over her and Vincent. 

So, she’s very scheming that way, but on the other hand, is extremely straightforward. We have no evidence that she was underhanded toward Élisabeth, or tried to undermine her career, or gossiped against her or… We don’t have any evidence of that. So again, I found her hard to… I think she’s very savvy. I think she’s an 8 on the savvy meter, but scheming, I’m just not sure. Am I parsing it too closely? 

Ann: I would do, like, a 5 is where I would go for schemes because that balances out. Like, she had good schemes, but then she also failed to read the room. And so, it balances out to be kind of… 

Bridget: Correct, over and over again. 

Ann: It balances each other out. There’s some stuff there, but then it’s kind of like… 

Bridget: Okay, I like that.

Ann: Yeah, that’s where I would put her there. Because yeah, it’s admirable, you know, when she fought for women to be in the Royal Academy and stuff, but it’s also, like, not the time or the place, Adelaide. This is not the person to be pissing off right now. 

Bridget: Yes, exactly, exactly. And just the unwillingness to turn her back on… It’s so dangerous. It’s, like, combustibly dangerous to hold on to that painting. I mean, thank god she gives it up when they ask her to and doesn’t try to hide it. [laughs] To me, you saw a lot of that in the French Revolution and that kind of schemieness that would get your head cut off. I mean, Vincent’s sister is executed for a completely trumped-up crazy thing. So, she does know, and many artists were as well. Yeah, like, ride this wave as long as you can, but you better know when to hop off. 

Ann: Yeah, no. And so compared to Madame du Barry. For instance, Adelaide, she did eventually read the room where Madame du Barry truly never did. 

Bridget: No, my gosh.

Ann: But they did have a similar thing of like, “This is going to pass,” and I’m sure lots of people thought that because why would you think our entire society is going to completely change? No one would think that when it’s happening. 

Bridget: In a minute!

Ann: But they both had a sort of optimism past the point of where you’d think that’s a smart way to be, both of them. You know what? I want to do Significance last because I think that’ll be such a good discussion. So, we’re going to move on to the Sexism Bonus and this is where we give points for how much did sexism hold her back. I feel like a lot and yet, she did get into the Royal Academy. 

Bridget: Exactly. The interesting thing about the sexism part is it held her back in so many ways in her lifetime and posthumously because art history erases her as well because there can only be one woman and also, we’re not that interested in women artists. I mean, you know, so that’s huge. But what’s fascinating to me about her is that there’s a difference between men and patriarchy and men were great for Adelaide. She had amazing teachers, her father was actually quite decent to her, her friendship and whatever it was with Vincent was key. She had these men who supported her throughout her lifetime and her career. It happened because of the support of men. And I find that so heartening and lovely. Was the entire system of, like, just the most structural patriarchy possible? Yes! So, it’s only men who can undermine it. It’s kind of like women winning the right to vote, it required men to vote for women to get the vote. So, individual men were great for her; sexism, very bad for her. 

Ann: Yeah. Well, the fact that she… Initially, even just the fact is like, eventually, she got the training she wanted, but it was “Well, we can train you to be a miniaturist, that’s what we’re able to do for you,” which because her father allowed that and, like, the teachers did that. I mean, even just the whole function of the Royal Academy where it’s like, “Well, we can only have four women.” “Oh, you can’t have an apartment because you have female students.” So, it’s like, that’s the patriarchy that was… 

Bridget: Entirely, entirely. In terms of sexism, you couldn’t ask for a system more set up to make it impossible for a woman to succeed, including posthumously into art history. 

Ann: So, where would you put that on a 0 to 10? 

Bridget: I decided 9. 

Ann: Yeah, because if we’re looking at the patriarchy, not the like individual men who were good to her, you know, #NotAllMenOfThe18thCenturyFrance, [both laugh] but the system itself is just, like, really… 

Bridget: Yes, horrible! As was Western art history for a long time. 

Ann: Yeah. So, I mean, she did what she did, like, and that’s why I have this category. It’s kind of like, how much more could she have done if she didn’t have to spend so much of her time dealing with patriarchy? And it’s like, I think a lot!

Bridget: A hundred percent! 

Ann: It’s like, how many giant history paintings could she have been commissioned to do if, like, women were allowed to do that? 

Bridget: Right! And hello, she’s not able to win the Prix de Rome. I mean, Vincent goes and spends four years in Rome doing nothing but studying classical art. You can’t make that up scrambling on your own trying to figure it out. The barrier to becoming a great artist is impossibly high. Not to mention she wasn’t allowed to study the nude, which is required, it’s a requirement of a history painting to have access to the nude body and she can’t join the Royal Academy classes, she’s not supposed to study from the male nude. 

Ann: Did she ever paint a man’s body or just men’s portraits? 

Bridget: Well, she would have painted men’s bodies…

Ann: In that history painting. 

Bridget: In the history painting, right. So, that’s why women are allowed portraiture, right? You don’t have to have the whole body. She does show the whole body in some portraits of men. I would say two things. One is that we have a lot of evidence now that women just got around it one way or another. I mean, the most obvious way is the one that was for hundreds of years, they use plaster casts or classical sculpture or even neoclassical sculpture of their time, or other ways. And I posit in the book, maybe Vincent helped her, he was teaching her oil painting. He had a body. 

Ann: Well, and this is someone who I might be, I might be doing an episode about later. I’m not sure. I’m not sure if there’s enough to say about her, but there’s a painter in the same era called Angelica Kauffman who was Swiss. 

Bridget: English Royal Academy, British Royal Academy. 

Ann: And when you look at her paintings, it’s clear that she was not allowed to look at male nudes because her men have very feminine musculature and bodies. 

Bridget: And you can see the opposite in, if you look at, like, a Michelangelo female nude, they don’t look like women. So yeah, that would not surprise me. Oh yeah, you should do Angelica Kauffman. Oh yeah! 

Ann: Yeah. No, she was very, very trendy for a while. But I just, when I read that detail, I was like, I had never thought about that, but the whole, like the women—

Bridget: I mean, that’s apparently why women are restricted from being history painters; it’s bad for their morals. 

Ann: Yeah, to see a nude man, oh my gosh! Yeah, that would—

Bridget: Although just to be clear, they are seeing art [laughs] which is filled with nudity. So, it’s like, it’s weird. Art is weird, man. 

Ann: Okay. The final category, and I feel like I know where you’re going to head with this, but I want to have this discussion, is Significance, her significance. And this is her significance both as a historical figure, like, as a woman who kind of broke some barriers and was fighting for other people, but also as an artist and just in her legacy. She’s not as well remembered as Élisabeth but that doesn’t mean that she’s not significant. So, what are your thoughts on that? As the person who spent years, [chuckles] years, decades thinking about her? 

Bridget: I know, it’s hard for me because it’s like, I’m like the, you know, I’m like the crazy Taylor Swift stan who, like, you know, knows everything and loves everything about her. I’m definitely that person. So, if I were, you know, for myself, to me, her significance is a 10, right? She is the first artist to depict herself with women’s students. She is one of the first women who does not come from an artistic background to make her way to the highest level of art. She is a woman who speaks out for other women. She is an incredibly accomplished painter and artist, despite everything arrayed against her. I love her work. I love her story. 

That said, she does not have a large oeuvre because she didn’t make that much work. She was ill the last years of her life, the things we were talking about, she had to really struggle to get the training that she needed to create work. And because Napoleon basically makes it very difficult for women artists— Although he does open up the salons, so women can show work. Salons are open to everyone, not just people who are part of the Institute de France. So, there are a lot of women artists, but France doesn’t have a great history of important women artists until much later in the 19th century. So, her legacy is not great as an artist, her oeuvre is not huge. So, when you talk about significance, it kind of depends on what you mean. But I think as a historical figure, her significance is very high. I would give her an 8 or a 9. 

Ann: I’m going to round it up to 9 because there’s so much stacked against her. 

I’m going to do some quick math, which is not my strong suit, but I want to…

Bridget: Oh lord, me neither. 

Ann: This is going to be… Just pulling out my calculator because it’s just more than I have fingers to count it. So, this is a 32. 32 out of 40, which in terms of my scale, and all the people have talked about anything above 30 is very notable. 

Bridget: I would say in the history of art, she is very notable as a woman artist. In terms of her work, what she would have hoped for, she was not able to achieve, but it’s kind of, like, she has two or three masterpieces that are phenomenal. 

I just want to say about “Self-Portrait with Two Pupils,” It was offered to the Louvre, you know, as a donation to the Louvre by Vincent’s heirs, and they turned it down as a work of no value. Like, “What would we do with this work of no value?” And now it’s considered one of the most important paintings in the Metropolitan Museum of Arts, 18th century collection. 

Ann: What was the one you said that recently sold for, like, much more than its asking price? 

Bridget: No, that’s a pastel. That’s a pastel called “Madame Mitoire and Her Children,” and it was acquired by the Getty in Los Angeles for six or seven times over its bidding estimate. It’s really notable because it shows, you know, just how significant her work and her place in art has become. But also, that depiction was the first depiction of a contemporary woman nursing, breastfeeding in the salon. So, it has this important place. 

So, there’s that painting, there’s this painting of her with her two students, like, always elevating these women and women’s work, and the things that women do to the level of high art. And that is what makes her so important as an artist and a painter and a woman and historical figure. 

Ann: I just wanted to give you some scale of what it means for her to have a 32 on the scale, like who was where. Sally Hemmings, also 32. I think in terms of just, like, a woman whose story has been, whose life was so— Well, I mean, Sally Hemings, a whole other, in a whole other way and yet, they were both in France at the same time. But just, like, the patriarchy and how society was built up so they could not thrive. 

Bridget: Yes, and how they’re being recognized now for who they were, what they’ve done. And so, that is huge, huge, huge, huge. The thing that amazes me and excites me about people like Sally Hemmings, about Labille-Guiard, Adelaide, is you change the future by knowing their stories. Like, when we know more about the past, it changes who we are, and how we see the world and the choices that we make. It changes everything. It’s really exciting. And that’s why what you’re doing is really important. It’s important.

Ann: Thank you. 

Bridget: These stories have a lot of power.

Ann: Yeah, I think that looking at these stories, especially the stories of people whose stories have not been shared or who have not been known, like, working-class people, poor people, women, especially is what I’m focusing on. 

Bridget: People of colour.

Ann: Yeah. It’s just, if you look at history, like, the history of the French Revolution, it’s like Robespierre, you’ve got Marie Antoinette, who we’re going to get to. But I mean, like, they are these larger-than-life figures, but then it’s like, but what about the people who are there living every day? 

Bridget: Most people. [laughs]

Ann: Yeah! And like Adelaide was there. She’s just like, “All I want is to be a painter, get these commissions, like get an apartment in the Louvre,” and she’s living her life while these huge world events are happening around her and I think that’s relatable to us also, like, living through the last 10 years of, like, society, where it’s like, I’m just doing a podcast and it’s like, major world events keep happening and I’m like, “Well, I’m just trying to do my podcast.” So, I’m like, it’s relatable to me that she’s like, “I just want to finish my painting. This is what I’m doing. I have dreams!” 

Bridget: Yeah, exactly. And you’re ambitious and she was ambitious. And to hold on to that, even when the world is going to hell, although I mean, I have to say like, although I think the last 10 years have been absolutely insane, especially as an American, it’s super terrifying and overwhelming, and at the same time, when you know about history, it’s like, there have been a lot of these times. It’s hard. Life history is hard, you don’t know what’s going to happen. And it gives me a lot of hope and a lot of courage when I look at the past. You know, I want to keep doing my work, I know it’s valuable, I know it matters. Even if compared to the significance of world events, it might not seem like it does. Emily Dickinson kept writing poems. Thank god she did. 

Ann: Just having lived through the past 10, like, this is where I’ve been taking my history work more seriously too in the last 10 years, but also the world has been chaos. But then that’s where I can kind of understand the history better and the importance of what people were doing. It’s like, not everybody was a soldier on the battlefield and not everybody was… Like, people were just having their lives and their dreams and their goals and their ambitions, despite the fact that the country they’re living in is in the midst… like Adelaide, it’s like, “Oh, the Reign of Terror is happening.” But on a day-to-day basis, she’s like, “Well, I guess I’ll just keep working on my painting because like, what else am I going to do?” 

Bridget: Right. I mean, you’re keeping your head down to hold onto it and keeping your head down working. 

Ann: Yeah. So, I don’t know. It’s, it’s relatable in a different way than if I was doing this reading 10 years ago.

Bridget: I mean, when I was researching and reading so much about the French Revolution during the pandemic, and it’s so dark. I mean, the French Revolution, it’s like, oh yeah, the opening ceremonies of the Olympics. And there’s like, “Ha-ha, there’s Marie Antoinette without a head, spreading blood, ha-ha.” If you read the stories, it’s horrific. These were real people. It’s horrific. I mean, it was so terrifying when I was reading all this in the midst of 2020. And we know how it turned out, like, we’re fine, here we are. But we didn’t know it was going to be. We didn’t know. And I have to say also, as an American, like, you know, one of the terrifying turns that happens in French history is women lose all these rights, they lose them very suddenly, and they go from being real players in French government, in French intellectual circles, in French art, to really being second class citizens. French women are some of the last to receive or to get the vote, for example, in the 20th century. It lasts. That pushing back against women’s rights lasts for a century or more. So, to experience Roe v. Wade being overturned in the United States while I was working on this book, too, it’s like, it’s very scary. You see, things can change in a heartbeat, they can change so quickly. It’s… Yeah, man, but they can change in both directions. 

Ann: Well, then you’ve got people like Adelaide and Madame du Barry who are just kind of like, “This is going to work out. This is going to work out.” [laughs]

Bridget: Yeah. I mean, that’s where she was a little too… 

Ann: At what point are you just like, “Let’s pack up my canvases and go to England.”? 

Bridget: Yeah. But I don’t think they could have. Madame du Barry is in a completely different situation. Maybe they could have. I don’t know. You’ve got to wonder about Vincent, his sister is guillotined. But also, you can’t just escape. I mean, they’re famous, they’re well-known people. They’ll also be stopped. I don’t know, I don’t know. It’s complicated. It’s complicated. 

Ann: Yeah. Well, it’s the same. We’re talking talking, but I just want to say in Canada, every time there’s an American election, there’s always this sort of meme of people like, “Oh, I’ll just move to Canada. I’ll just move to Canada.” Where it’s just like, that’s not an option for everybody. Like, you can’t just, if your state has shitty laws, lots of people can’t leave. 

Bridget: It’s not an option for anyone. Okay, both my kids went to college in Canada. You can’t just go to Canada, it’s another country, okay? You need a visa. You need a passport that will allow you to go in and stay. I don’t know what— When people talk about that, I’m like, what are you talking about? 

Ann: Yeah. And I mean, frankly, things are not great here either. 

Bridget: Right, exactly. I mean, the world is the world. That is a fantasy. I will say though, both my kids were in Canada during the pandemic and I did feel like they were safer than here. So, that’s… That’s maybe my fantasy. 

Ann: But you know, we’re living in history just like Adelaide was.

Bridget: Yes, we’re living in history and the thing about history is you don’t know how things are going to turn out. So, I really, really need to say despair is not an option. Despair is not an option. Keep working and this work matters. 

Ann: Well, and thank you so much for joining me on the podcast. I’m glad that I’ve radicalized you into being a listener of my podcast now. 

Bridget: Yes, I love it! 

Ann: [laughs] Well, especially like we’re doing this time period that you’re very familiar with. So I think that’s a great entry point. 

Bridget: It’s so fun for me. I can’t wait to learn more about Britain because I really that’s like my black hole. 

Ann: Yeah. And I’m the opposite. Like, I’m learning all this stuff about France. The fact that everyone is called Marie and Louis, I was just like, I don’t have time for that. I don’t have time for that. And I’m just like, “Oh my god, I have to learn it. Blahhh!” So, I’m having people like you teach me and that’s great. [Bridget laughs] That’s much more palatable than reading some, like, old academic books. 

Bridget: Give them a name for yourself. That’s what I often do. 

Ann: I have to. Yes. Anyway, thank you so much for talking with me. Everybody should go out and read your book because we’re just truly touching the surface of the story of Adelaide, which is, like, so interesting. 

Bridget: Definitely. And you guys, it’s fun!

Ann: Your book is funny. Your book has jokes. Your book has some swearing in it. And I found that reassuring as a person who’s writing a book that I want to have be fun and have swearing in it. I’m like, “Oh, look! This is allowed. Good.” 

Bridget: It’s fine. It’s fine. Art is not off limits from life. 

Ann: Well, thank you. Thank you so, so much for talking with me. 

Bridget: Thank you, what a pleasure. 

Ann: Yeah, take care. 

Bridget: Thanks, you too! 

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So, I really, really super recommend Bridget’s book, Portrait of a Woman, which you can find wherever you get your books from. I think it’s also a beautiful object, it’s a beautiful book, which we’re getting close to gift-giving season and I think this would be a great gift to give to somebody who’s interested in this era and then women artists and things like that. 

I’m going to give you a couple reminders about things, but first I will let you know that I too am writing a book. So, my book is about Caroline of Brunswick, it’s called Rebel of the Regency. And I really am buckling down to finish writing this book. So, for the next little bit on the podcast, there’s still going to be an episode every week, you know, there’s some podcasts I listen to and when they take a break and they leave entirely, I’m just like, “But where’s my emotional support podcast?” And knowing how it feels for me, I want to make sure I always have something coming out for you. So, next week is going to be a special bonus episode that I think you’re going to enjoy. It’s somebody who I wanted to talk about on the season and it just didn’t quite fit in, but I figured it away to make it work. Anyway, that’s next week. And so, there’s still going to be episodes coming out, it’s just going to be, this is our last, like, Marie Antoinette-themed thing for a bit because I don’t have time to research that. I need to finish writing my book. If you want to hear more about my journey to writing my book about Caroline of Brunswick, if you join my Patreon, I’m posting lots of updates there. Anyway, this episode was about Bridget Quinn’s book. And so, I would say that’s a book that exists and everybody should go and read that now. 

And if you want to stay up with me and what I’m up to, so I am on Instagram @VulgarHistoryPod and I’m also on Threads @VulgarHistoryPod, Threads is really popping lately. So, that’s the place where you can find me just, like, you know, shit posting or whatever. And I’m also on Substack, which is, like— So, Substack, the main thing that I really appreciate about what that site is doing is that I can post my essays, my writing there. So, you can follow along there to see what I’m posting there. Like, I try to post something every other week, lately, it’s been like every week. And if you’re like, “Ann, aren’t you writing a book?” Here’s my secret. What I’m posting on Substack are things that I wrote ages ago. And I’m just kind of, like, refreshing them and re-editing them. So, it’s a way to share stuff that I wrote a while ago that maybe people haven’t seen with a new audience. Anyway, so I’m on Substack at “Vulgar History A La Carte.” You can find me there. 

And I mentioned the Patreon earlier, that’s where you can keep with my updates about this book project I’m working on. So, if you go to Patreon, if you go to the Patreon app, or you go to Patreon.com/AnnFosterWriter, that is where you’ll find my page there. So, I’m posting little episodes there, like you heard on your podcast feed last week, there was the episode or a week, two weeks ago? Anyway, I’m doing updates there. It’s called “Ann Is Writing A Book” and it’s like little podcast episodes where I just talk about my process of writing the book. And you can get this on Patreon by joining for free! I’m making that content available for free because I want everyone to hear and to be able to join me on the witches road as I write this book. 

Anyway, if you want to join the Patreon and support me in a financial way, you can do that. If you pledge $1 a month, you get early, ad-free access to all episodes of Vulgar History, including past episodes, you can listen to those without commercials in them. And you don’t have to listen to them in Patreon itself. If once you join the Patreon, you’ll get an RSS feed, is what it’s called, and then you can like copy paste that into wherever you listen to your podcast. So, you can listen to all the bonus content on Spotify or on Apple Podcasts or on Podcast Addict or wherever you listen to your stuff on the Patreon. Also, if you joined for $5 or more a month, you get access to first of all, the Vulgar History Discord server, which is like a big group chat where we just like talk about stuff and it’s a nice time. And also at that $5 or more a month level, you get access to bonus episodes of things like Vulgarpiece Theatre, which, again, I’m writing a book, Lana Wood Johnson, my co-host in Vulgarpiece Theatre, also writing a book, Allison Epstein, super busy with their book that’s coming out soon. But I do hope to be back up and running with Vulgarpiece Theatre soon. But if you’re just joining the Patreon, you can list all the past Vulgarpiece Theatre episodes there. There’s also bonus episodes of things like So This Asshole or talk about shitty men from history and The Aftershow where I talk with some of my show guests anyway, sometimes. So, the whole thing with Patreon is it’s the way that I’m providing bonus stuff for you and you are helping follow me. And that is just, like, a nice thing for everybody. 

We also have, you know, gift giving season is approaching. And our brand partner is Common Era Jewelry, which is a women-owned small business that makes beautiful heirloom jewelry. They make pieces in gold, how do you call it? Solid gold, as well as a more affordable gold vermeil. They make beautiful necklaces, rings. They also have things if you’re like, “But I don’t wear gold jewelry.” Do you wear scrunchies? They have those too. Do you wear hair bows? They also do that. I love partnering with this company and the reason why we became partners in the first place is because our vibes are so in sync because most of their pieces are inspired by women from history with a lot of overlap of women we’ve talked about on this podcast. So, they’ve got pieces inspired by Hatshepsut, I’m just like listing things I have bought from them. There’s the Anne Boleyn pendant, but also Boudica is there Cleopatra, Agrippina, and also women from… Like other women from history we haven’t talked about like Sappho is there the poet, and then also women from classical mythology like Medusa, I have that necklace too. Aphrodite, other people like that, goddesses, as they would say on I, Claudius. Anyway, so vulgar history listeners always get 15% off whatever you buy from Common Era jewelry. So, you go to CommonEra.com/Vulgar or use code ‘VULGAR’ at checkout. Oh, I just remembered. I guess Halloween has just passed, but they also have Hecate or some people pronounce it Hecat, Hecate, which is a big vibe for if you’ve been watching Agatha All Along, which I am really, really, really into. I guess when you hear this, the show will have ended, but I’m probably just rewatching it. Anyways, if you want that like witchy vibe, there’s Hecate as well. 

Anyway, if you want to buy some Vulgar History merchandise, you can get that also great for gift giving season. So if you’re in the US, I recommend going to VulgarHistory.com/Store, which takes you to our TeePublic store where you can get all the beautiful artist-designed silly in-jokes of things, as well as what I think a lot of people are into, or I’m really into, but people have been buying it so I’ll say people are into it too, is the crewneck varsity sweatshirt that says “Vulgar History,” so it kind of looks like you go to the University of Vulgar History, which you kind of are. You know, you’re being schooled by me. If you’re outside the US, I recommend using our other store, our Redbubble store, which is VulgarHistory.Redbubble.com. 

And if you want to get in touch with me, you know, I’m busy writing a book, but you know, I look at my messages. You can get in touch with me. There’s a form at VulgarHistory.com, and that sends emails to me and that’s what you can do. Anyway, we’ll be here next week. We’re always going to be here every week, there’s always going to be an episode. Next week is going to be a special bonus that I think you’ll enjoy. And until next time, keep your… I love it! I love that part of the French Revolution is this group called the sans-culottes, which like, they’re wearing pants, they’re wearing big, flowy palazzo pants, they’re not wearing little knickers, they’re not wearing culottes. But just the fact that they’re called sans-culottes just makes me think of our thing we say, which is “pants on,” I feel like the sans-culottes are like, “No, pants off.” But anyway, unless you’re a sans-culotte, keep your pants on and your tits out. 

Vulgar History is hosted, written, and researched by Ann Foster, that’s me! The editor is Cristina Lumague. Theme music is by the Severn Duo. The Vulgar History show image is by Deborah Wong. Transcripts are written by Aveline Malek. Find transcripts of recent episodes at VulgarHistory.com.

References:

Click here to buy a copy of Bridget’s book.

Look at a gallery of Adélaïde’s work on her Wikipedia page here.

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Get 15% off all the gorgeous jewellery and accessories at common.era.com/vulgar or go to commonera.com and use code VULGAR at checkout

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Get Vulgar History merch at vulgarhistory.com/store (best for US shipping) and vulgarhistory.redbubble.com (better for international shipping)

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Support Vulgar History on Patreon

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