Femme of the Week: Anne Vallayer-Coster

Anne Vallayer-Coster was born Anne Vallayer December 21st, 1744. She practiced painting all her life and on July 28th 1770 at 26 she offered her 'portfolio' for consideration to the Academie. Her 'portfolio' consisted of small paintings of "scientific and artistic'' instruments. Well it was a good thing she tried because the Academie accepted her! In fact * waves fan * she was one of 3 great women of her time to be accepted!

Vallayer was very popular, and although she was a beauty her popularity rose from her clear artistic talent. At this point she mainly focused on her still-life paintings. They were beautiful and market-able. But brighter commissions soon followed!

In the summer of 1779 comte d'Angiviller gave her a commission for a full portrait of Madame Sophie. For that she was to receive 6,000 livres!

According to Roland Michel there is a painting in the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore that is 'signed' by Vallayer and dated 1778. It is a small portrait of Marie Antoinette. It has been thought to be a 19th century copy of an original lost to time, but either way it is believable. Apparently in 1779 Marie put forth an effort to support Vallayer, "being allocated lodgings in the Louvre." And this is an action known to a Queen who was not the greatest patron of arts. Of Marie, Vallayer had painted a pastel portrait (in a private collection, sorry I don't have an image of that one!)
"Have you ever been done in pastels?" "No, I don't travel much."

She also did portraits of the Kings other aunts; Madame Victorie and Madame Adelaide. These royal commissions were an artists key to fame and fortune. If today's artist wants to show paintings in NYC galleries, the 18th century artist wanted their paintings on the walls of Versailles. Vallayer-Coster was also fortunate enough to survive the Revolution. Not only did she survive but so did her career. In 1804 she had a commission by Josephine!

The Fashionable Man: Hair Edition

Yes, Marie and Georgiana spent countless hours sitting for a coiffeur who worked miracles out of pomade and powder. And the men, well they just sat back and complained about the frivolity and cost of the whole ordeal. right????


Well not quite! The fashionable men wore their hair both powdered and curled, and don't think they woke up every morning and fixed their curls.

Every man had his own coiffeur ( there were over 1200 mens hairdressers in Paris by 1780!), and although your typical guy did not ask for his hair to be piled three feet above his head (see left) but they did request their hair to be styled in the latest fashion. For the men, like the ladies, hair design was constantly changing. One week it could be all the fashion to wear two horizontal curls along side the face and the next week four of these curls was the only way to go.

Average time to be styled was about an hour. They wore pomade as the ladies did, and scented powder of their choosing. Like the ladies again they would have to cover their faces when it was powder time.

Okay, now I am going to ask you to visualize this:
Prince Kaunitz chose to have 20 or so men line up in a gallery, and while making a huge cloud of powdered mist he would run quickly down the hall ensuring an even layer of fine dust on his hair-doo. Yeah.

So, were the men actually complaining about the frivolous women? Yes indeed! and to make a point that they (the men) did not fall victim to such frivolities they would often throw their hat on as soon as their coiffure had finished, messing it up a bit. This made the bold statement:

Yea, I look good and I know it. But I don't give a damn about 'fashion' or 'hair'.

Marie Antoinette Premiere, 2006 Fashions

This post is strictly for fun (and yet oh so topical!) I have not been able to post in a few days but Heather was just mentioning her disappointment at the fashion worn to The Duchess premiere. So I thought it would be fun to see what people were wearing to the premiere of Marie Antoinette, two years ago. So here you go, a fun comparison!