Summer in Paris, 1783. The Louvre steps, too hot and no breeze, the air electric with the heady anticipation of a coming storm: the year’s Royal Salon. Bewigged and powdered Parisians mill amid pigeons, dogs, and detritus; food and flower sellers; pamphleteers and propagandists. Men and women of every estate (clergy, nobles, commoners) are united under art: to love it, to despise it, to gossip endlessly about it.
Exhibiting at the Royal Salon was not for the faint of heart, and it was never intended for women.
Enter Adélaïde Labille-Guiard . . .
“A deliciously inventive biography of Adélaïde Labille-Guiard (1749-1803) …This excellent work of art history deserves a wide readership.” – Publishers Weekly, Starred Review