In the final decades of the 18th century, Adélaïde Labille-Guiard was the greatest rival of Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun (1755-1842). It was not, however, the artist’s only claim to fame. Her art was uncompromising, and her clientele, the esteem that she earned from the Mesdames – the aunts of Louis XVI – and the opinions of contemporary critics all indicated an exceptional artist with no need to envy her male colleagues.
Unlike many of her contemporaries, A. Labille-Guiard’s did not come from a family of painters or sculptors. Her father, Claude-Edme Labille, was a fashion merchant on Rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs in Paris. His daughter has received an early artistic education, most likely beginning in 1763, from the miniaturist François-Élie Vincent (1708-1790). The painter was friends with A. Labille-Guiard’s parents and lived close to the family home, teaching at the Académie de Saint-Luc. Beginning then with small portraits, A. Labille-Guiard soon showed promise; her ambition came to the fore when she began using pastels, adding a new string to her bow. It is believed she may have sought guidance from Maurice Quentin de La Tour (1704-1788), who was not reticent to introduce women to the complex handling of coloured pastels.
In the Nouvelles de la république des lettres et des arts of 29 January 1783, Pahin de la Blancherie describes the artist as having been a student of M.-Q. de La Tour, and how successfully she followed in his footsteps. Later, shortly after A. Labille-Guiard’s death, her first biographer, Joachim Lebreton, indicates in the Nouvelle des arts that the artist had judged her own work inferior, if not to her reputation, then at least to what she could expect herself to achieve. Hence why she had sought out M.-Q. de La Tour, rapidly proving herself a worthy student of such a skilled master. This encounter marked a turning point, moving away from the restrictions of miniature painting. Her works made her name immediately commendable to leading artists, who sensed that her talent and, above all, her courage would allow her to surpass the limits that she seemed to have set herself earlier in her career.

Her first exhibited works, at the Salon of the Académie de Saint-Luc in 1774, interested critics. The anonymous author of the “Letter to M. le Marquis de *** on the paintings and sculptures on display at the Hôtel de Jabac in 1774” describes how “Mademoiselle Labile, wife of M. Guiard, exhibited few portraits, but these few are of vivid gestures and a true colour: the planes are well executed, the highlights broad and well-shaded: neither contours nor brushstrokes are heavy. One sees that her aim is to concentrate all effect in the highlights. This is indeed the most agreeable part of the image, but not the strongest. She sacrifices too much of her shadows, which reduces the vigour particularly of the male heads. Her women are more successful […] the works of this lady suggest that she will continue to progress. They are at once truthful and pleasing.”

Now a miniaturist and pastelist, A. Labille-Guiard next set her sights on oil painting. She asked the advice of François-André Vincent (1746-1816), the son of her first teacher and a childhood friend. Her initial oil paintings date from the early 1780s and show that here too she would prove herself.
On 31 May 1783 the artist was admitted to the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, during an exceptional session in which E. Vigée Le Brun also gained admittance. In fact, A. Labille-Guiard was particularly proud to have won a place based on her own talents, and not as the result of an order by Queen Marie-Antoinette as had her rival. She regularly showed works at the Salon and there her reputation was reinforced, yet she also faced criticism, for though some recognised in her a great talent, others accused her of having her friend F.-A. Vincent to finish her oil portraits for her.
In 1786 the Mesdames, aunts of the king, granted A. Labille-Guiard the honour of sitting for her. In 1788 the Count of Provence, brother of Louis XVI, commissioned her to paint a monumental canvas depicting the prince receiving a knight of the Order of Saint Lazarus and Mount Carmel. The work was expected to be rich “in the number of figures and the abundance of accessories” and to respect the rules of history painting – that most noble of genres, generally inaccessible to women artists, who were most often relegated to the painting of portraits and still lifes. In September 1790, the painting was almost complete. But fate did not smile on the painter: on 20 June 1791, the Count emigrated without paying her; on 11 August 1793, an order was given to burn the canvas.

Though the artist proved adept at renewing her clientele after 1789, presenting fourteen portraits of members of the National Assembly during the 1791 Salon, the years that followed the Revolution proved more difficult. She would exhibit at the Salons of 1795, 1798, 1799 and 1800, where she received her final tributes. On 8 June 1800, she finally married her long-time companion, F.-A. Vincent. In April 1803 A. Labille-Guiard died in her apartment at the Collège des Quatre-Nations, facing the Louvre.