The Portraitist: A Novel of Adelaide Labille-Guiard

Adélaïde Labille-Guiards is a talented artist in 18th-century Paris who faces an uphill battle to succeed in the competitive art world. She faces criticism for her love affair with her instructor and her decision to make money by executing erotic pastels. Her rival becomes Marie Antoinettes official portraitist and gains entrance to the elite Académie Royale. When Adélaïde earns her own royal appointment, she faces political chaos and revolution in her beloved Paris and must find a way to adjust to the new order and stay alive.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 296 pages
Publication date: 30 August 2022
Publisher: She Writes Press

Based on a true story, this is the tale of Adélaïde Labille-Guiards fight to take her rightful place in the competitive art world of eighteenth-century Paris. With a beautiful rival who is better connected and better trained than she is, Adélaïde faces an uphill battle. Her love affair with her young instructor in oil painting gives rise to suspicions that he touches up her work, and her decision to make much-needed money by executing erotic pastels threatens to create as many problems as it solves. Meanwhile, her rival goes from strength to strength, becoming Marie Antoinettes official portraitist and gaining entrance to the elite Académie Royale at the same time as Adélaïde. When at last Adélaïde earns her own royal appointment and receives a massive commission from a member of the royal family, the timing couldnt be worse: its 1789, and with the fall of the Bastille, her world is turned upside down by political chaos and revolution. With danger around every corner in her beloved Paris, she must find a way to adjust to the new order, carving out a life and a career all over again—and stay alive in the process.

Dimension: 215 x 139 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781647420970