Self-Portrait with Two Pupils

In 1785 the Academy counted four women and would admit no more. Labille-Guiard answers with a manifesto two metres high: herself at the easel in fashionable dress, her two pupils flanking her — painting is a trade, and women teach it. The histories that followed filed her as 'the rival of Vigée Le Brun': a footnote defined by another woman.

Part of the 'Erased Masterpieces' curatorial series celebrating women artists restored to art history.