Have you seen...Two Portraits in One?

Elisabeth Vigée-Le Brun, Self-portrait, 1790, Vasari Corridor, Uffizi Gallery,
Florence (Photo: Andy Barker)

I will never forget the moment that I first saw this painting.  It was the subject of my Master’s Dissertation and I had been longing to see it ‘in the flesh’ for some time.  It hangs in the Vasari Corridor, a passageway linking the Uffizi Gallery and the Pitti Palace in Florence.  This passageway was built directly over the Ponte Vecchio by Vasari himself on the orders of the then Duke of Florence, Cosimo I de Medici. Cosimo needed a covered route between his palace and his office that would be private and uncluttered by the everyday person.  He was also amassing a collection of artists’ self-portraits, and this Corridor was the ideal place to hang them.  Elisabeth Vigée-Le Brun’s image has since joined that illustrious group.

My husband and I visited the Uffizi Gallery on a day trip from Rome, specifically to see this portrait.  The problem was, that unbeknown to us, the Vasari Corridor is generally locked to the public and can only be visited when booked in advance and in a group.  Everyone in uniform that we asked simply shook their heads, and I got more and more desperate.  In the end we left the Gallery and found the Superintendent, a lady who had a smattering of English and a very kind heart!  She made phonecalls, spoke to security people and eventually, took us through the back door of the Uffizzi Gallery, up some steps and under an official-looking security tape.  Another lady unlocked a door, pushed us gently through it and locked it behind us!  

Vasari Corridor, Uffizi Gallery, Florence,
(Photo: Andy Barker)

 We were on our own at the top of a steep blue-carpeted staircase and there was complete silence.  A man then appeared at the bottom of the stairs and beckoned for us to follow him.  He was the caretaker and jangled a huge set of keys as he walked.  He led us into a narrow corridor with a curved ceiling set with dim lights.  There was the occasional window, circular, like a porthole and with a grill across it. Lining the walls on both sides were paintings, all self-portraits.  Our guide had one word of English, “photo”, which he kept repeating, telling us to take pictures of the masterpieces surrounding us.  As we walked we felt the hairs stand up on the backs of our necks and neither of us spoke.  It was rather like a dream.  We kept walking until we found her. 

Vasari Corridor, Uffizi Gallery, Florence, (Photo: Andy Barker)

She sat there, serenely, gently smiling out of the canvas, paintbrush in one hand and palette in the other.  The intriguing thing about this work is that Elisabeth Vigée-Le Brun is allowing us to see what she is painting.  In many of her self-portraits, she shows herself simply looking out of the canvas, or holding the tools of her trade, or sometimes wearing a fancy dress costume.  There are two main portraits where she explicitly shares her work with us, this one and its twin, which hangs at Ickworth House in Norfolk.  They are in fact, not entirely identical, as you will see if you examine the image on the canvas on which Vigée-Le Brun is painting.  The Ickworth portrait (below) shows the face of a young girl who seems to emerge out of the canvas and into the room.  This girl is Julie, Vigée-Le Brun’s daughter.  However, the Uffizi self-portrait shows an entirely different face, a shadowy, indistinct and altogether less ‘real’ image, the haunting features of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France.

Elisabeth Vigée-Le Brun, Self-Portrait, 1791, Ickworth House, Norfolk 
(photo: Alison Barker)

Vigée-Le Brun lived during the French Revolution of 1789 and painted portraits for many of the French aristocracy who ended up losing their lives on the guillotine.  She herself, managed to escape Paris and wandered Europe, painting and writing her Memoirs.  She was proud of her images of the doomed Queen, many of which were large and imposing and have ended up in Vienna.  This one however, an intimate portrayal demonstrating Vigée-Le Brun’s own close connection to the Queen, has ended up here, in a quiet and atmospheric corridor over the River Arno and seen by very few.

As Andy and I left the Vasari Corridor and re-entered the sunlit world, we could not quite believe where we had been and the huge privilege we had been granted.

If you are visiting Florence, before you go, book a tour of the Vasari Corridor and experience not only the hushed feel of centuries of artists watching you as you pass by, but also the wistful gaze of Marie Antoinette.

Alison Barker

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