8vo. In two volumes. viii, 320; vii, [1], 308pp. Bound by Riviere & Son in contemporary brown half-morocco, tan cloth boards, ruled and lettered in gilt, T.E.G. Minor shelf-wear. Marbled endpapers, later inked ownership inscription of Conservative politician Sir Mervyn Lloyd Peel (1856-1929) to versos of both FFEPs, scattered foxing.

A handsome copy of the first edition in English of the memoirs of Élisabeth Louise Vigée-Lebrun (1755-1842), French Neoclassical portrait painter. Vigée Le Brun’s journey to fame and success was rapid. Having received some training from her portraitist father, she was encouraged to continue her artistic studies - although, being a woman, she did not have access to formal training. By the age of 15 she had already developed a modest clientele for her work. By 19, her portraits had gained so much attention that her painting materials were seized as she’d been operating as a professional artist without guild or academy membership. She swiftly joined the Académie de St Luc, at a time when very few women were admitted, and by the age of 20, she was established at court. Her fame skyrocketed in the late eighteenth-century, when she was patronised by Queen Marie-Antoinette; whom she painted some 30 portraits of. It was royal intervention that led to her admittance to the Académie Royale in 1783, having been previously rejected. Following the Revolution, she was forced into exile, travelling widely throughout Europe making a living from commissions from wealthy patrons.