Editing Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun (section)

=== Return to Paris and later life ===
==== New home at Louveciennes, the abdications of Napoleon and Bourbon restorations ====
After returning to Paris from her second visit to Switzerland, Vigée Le Brun purchased a house in [[Louveciennes]], [[Île-de-France (region)|Île-de-France]] near the [[Seine]], and invited her niece (daughter of her brother Étienne) Caroline Rivière and her husband to live with her. She doted on the newlywed couple and formed a close bond with them, and occasionally visited Paris. She had Mme. Pourat and the talented actress Comtesse de Hocquart as neighbors. She visited Madame du Barry's home, the [[Château de Louveciennes#The Pavilion|Pavillon de Louveciennes]], which she found had been looted and stripped clean of its furniture and contents. On 31 March 1814, her house was raided by [[Prussia]]n troops who were [[Battle of Paris (1814)|advancing towards Paris]] in the final stages of the war of the [[War of the Sixth Coalition|Sixth Coalition]]. As she prepared to go to bed after eleven o'clock, with no knowledge of the proximity of the allied troops, they entered her home, while she lay in her bed. They entered her bedchamber and proceeded to loot her home. Her German-speaking Swiss servant Joseph screamed at the soldiers to spare her person until his voice was hoarse. After the looting, the soldiers left her home. She left as well, initially intending to head to [[Saint-Germain-des-Prés]] before learning that the road there was unsafe. Instead she decided to take refuge in a room above [[Machine de Marly|the pumping machine at Marly aqueduct]], near Du Barry's pavilion, with many other people, having entrusted her house to Joseph. As fighting nearby intensified, Vigée Le Brun attempted to take refuge in cave, but gave up after injuring her leg. There, she observed how most of the merchants taking refuge were, like her, pining for the [[Bourbon Restoration in France|restoration of the Bourbons]].

She departed for Paris as soon as she received the news, and communicated by letter with Joseph about the condition of her Louveciennes home, which had been ransacked and its garden destroyed by the Prussian troops. Her servant wrote to her: "I beg them to be less greedy, to content themselves with whatever I give them, they reply: "The French have done far worse things in our country". Vigée Le Brun wrote in her memoirs "The Prussians are right; poor Joseph and I had to answer for that."

Vigée Le Brun was exultant at the entry of the Comte d'Artois to Paris on 12 April, shortly after Napoleon had agreed to abdicate. She wrote to him about the King, to which he replied: "His legs are still bad, but his mind is in excellent form. We will march for him, and he will think for us". She attended the euphoric reception of the King in Paris on 3 May 1814, and the restoration of the monarchy. The King personally gave her his regards while on his way to attend the Sunday services when he spotted her in a crowd.

Upon Napoleon's return from Elba, she noted the contrast between the rapturous reception the Bourbons had received the previous year and Napoleon's tepid welcome upon his return to France from his exile in [[Elba]], after which he initiated the [[Hundred Days]] war. Vigée Le Brun exhibited her staunch royalist sympathies in her memoirs, writing:
<blockquote>Without wishing to insult the memory of a great captain and many brave generals and soldiers who helped win such resounding victories, I would like nevertheless to ask where these victories led us, and whether we still own any of the land which cost us so dear? For my part, the bulletins from the Russian campaign both distressed and revolted me; one of the later ones spoke of the loss of thousands of French soldiers and added that the Emperor had never looked so well! We read this bulletin at the home of the Bellegarde ladies, and felt so angry that we threw it on to the fire. The fact that the people were tired of these interminable wars is easily attested by their lack of enthusiasm during the Hundred Days. More than once I saw Bonaparte appear at his window and then retire immediately, furious no doubt, for the acclamation of the crowd was limited to the shouts of a hundred or so boys, paid, I believe, as an act of derision to chant long live the Emperor! There is a sharp contrast between this indifference and the joyful enthusiasm which greeted the King on his entry into Paris on the 8th of July 1815; this joy was almost universal, for after the many misfortunes incurred by Bonaparte, [[Louis XVIII]] brought only peace.</blockquote>

Her Louveciennes home was once again looted in the [[Hundred Days]], this time by British troops. Among the possessions lost during this incident was a lacquer box gifted to her by the Count Stroganov during her stay at Saint Petersburg, which she had prized immensely. Her estranged husband died in August 1813, in their old home built on the Rue de-Gros-Chenet. Though they had drifted apart for several years, she was nonetheless sorely affected by his death.

In 1819 she sold her portrait of Lady Hamilton as the Comaean Sibyl to the Duc de Berri, despite it being her favorite, because she wished to satisfy the Duke. She also painted two portraits of the [[Marie-Caroline of Bourbon-Two Sicilies, Duchess of Berry|Duchesse de Berri]], initially in the Tuileries, but then finishing their sittings in her home. In the same year, her daughter Julie died of syphilis, which devastated her. The next year, her brother Étienne died an alcoholic, leaving her niece Caroline her principal heir. Her friends advised the grief-stricken artist to travel to [[Bordeaux]] to occupy her mind with something else. She traveled first to [[Orléans]], where she resided in the [[Château de Méréville]], where she was mesmerized by its elegance, beauty and architecture, designed in the [[English landscape garden|English Garden]] style; she wrote that it "surpassed anything of its kind in England". She toured the city and sampled its architecture and landmarks, including the [[Orléans Cathedral|cathedral]] and the ruins surrounding the city. She then traveled to [[Blois]] where she visited the [[Château de Chambord]], which she described it as "a romantic, fairy tale place". She then visited the [[Château de Chanteloup]], residence of the late [[Étienne François, duc de Choiseul]]. Afterwards, she traveled to [[Tours]], where the impure air forced her to quit the city after only two days. In Tours, she was received by the director of the academy, who offered to be her guide in the city. She also visited the ruins of the [[Marmoutier Abbey, Tours|Marmoutier monastery]]. She then passed [[Poitiers]] and [[Angoulême]] on her way to Bordeaux. After arriving in Bordeaux, she stayed in the Fumel Hospice and was received there by the prefect, the Comte [[Camille de Tournon-Simiane]]. She toured the countryside and visited the cemetery, which she praised for its sepulchral beauty and symmetrical layout. It became her second-favorite after the [[Père Lachaise Cemetery|Père La Chaise]] cemetery of Paris. She also visited the synagogue of Bordeaux, styled after the [[Solomon's Temple|temple of Solomon]], the ruins of the ancient Roman Gallien Arena. After spending a week in Bordeaux, she started back for Paris, greatly satisfied with her travels. During her journey, it was common for her to be mistaken for a noble lady owing to her expensive carriage; she later lamented in her memoirs that this often meant she had to pay more in the inns where she resided.

Her journey to Bordeaux was the last time she traveled extensively.

==== Friendship with Antoine Jean-Gros ====
The artist formed an intimate friendship with [[Antoine-Jean Gros]], whom she had known since he was seven years old and had painted his portrait when he was at that age, during which she had noticed an artistic inclination in the child. Upon her return to France she was surprised to find Gros had become a successful and famous painter, head of his own school of art. Gros was socially reclusive, and often brusque to others, but he formed a close bond with Vigée Le Brun, who wrote: "Gros was always a man of natural impulses. He was prone to feel the keenest sensations and would become equally passionate over a kind action or a beautiful work of art. He was ill at ease in society, rarely breaking the silence in a crowded place, but he listened attentively and replied with his gentle smile, or by a single word, always very apt. To appreciate Gros, one had to know him intimately. Then he would open up his heart, a kind and noble one at that; some people reproached him for having a certain brusqueness of tone, but this disappeared entirely in private. His conversation was even more fascinating because he never expressed himself in the same way as other men; always finding the most unusual and powerful images to convey a thought, you might almost say he painted with words."

She was greatly affected by his suicide in 1835; she had met him the day before and noted him brooding over criticism he had received over one of his paintings ''[[Hercules and Diomedes]]''.

==== Later years ====
[[File:Tombe vigee-lebrun.JPG|thumb|Vigée Le Brun's grave in [[Louveciennes]]]]

She spent most of her time in [[Louveciennes]], typically eight months of the year. She formed new friendships with people including the writer and man of letters M. de Briffaut, the playwright [[Jean-Baptiste-Denis Despré]], the writer [[Aimé Martin]], the composer [[Marc-Antoine Madeleine Désaugiers]], the painter and antiquarian [[Louis Nicolas Philippe Auguste de Forbin|Comte de Forbin]], and the famous painter [[Antoine-Jean Gros]]. She hosted these people and socialized with them regularly in her countryside home or in Paris, as well as her old friend the Princess Kourakin. She painted [[Genevieve|Saint Geneviève]], with the face being a posthumous portrait of 12-year old Julie. For the local chapel, the [[Stéphanie Félicité, comtesse de Genlis|Comtesse de Genlis]] graced this painting with two separate poems; one for the saint, the other for the painter. She spent her time with her nieces Caroline Rivière and Eugénie Tripier-Le Franc, whom she came to regard as her own children. She had tutored the latter in painting since childhood and was greatly pleased to see her blossom into a professional artist. Eugénie and Caroline would assist her in writing her memoirs, late in her life. She died in Paris on 30 March 1842, aged 86. She was buried at the [[Cimetière de Louveciennes]] near her old home. Her tombstone [[epitaph]] says "''Ici, enfin, je repose...''" (Here, at last, I rest...).<ref>{{Cite book |last=May |first=Gita |title=Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun : The Odyssey of an Artist in an Age of Revolution |publisher=Yale University Press |year=2005 |isbn=9780300108729 |pages=201}}</ref>