text: After her father's death, her mother sought to raise her spirits by taking her to the Palais de Luxembourg's art gallery; seeing the works of Peter Paul Rubens and other old masters left a great impression on her. She also visited numerous private galleries, including those of Rendon de Boisset, the Duc de Praslin[fr], and the Marquis de Levis; the artist took notes and copied the works of old masters such as Van Dyke, Rubens and Rembrandt to improve her art. At an early age, she reversed the order of her given Christian names, and was known among her inner circle as 'Louise'. For most of her life, she signed her paintings, documents and letters as "Louise
  Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun", although she acknowledged later in life that the correct baptismal order would be Élisabeth Louise.
  By the time she was in her early teens, Élisabeth was painting portraits professionally. She greatly disliked the contemporary High Rococo fashion, and often solicited her sitters to allow her to alter their apparel. Inspired by Raphael and Domenichino, she often draped her subjects in shawls and long scarves; these styles would later become ubiquitous in her portraiture. After her studio was seized for her practicing without a license, she applied to the Académie de Saint-Luc, which unwittingly exhibited her works in its Salon. In 1774, she was made a member of the Académie. Her studio's reputation saw a meteoric rise, and her renown spread outside France. By 1774, she had painted portraits which included those of the Comte Orloff, Comte Pierre Chouvaloff[ru] (one of Empress Elizabeth's favorites), the Comtesse de Brionne[fr], the Duchess of Orléans (future mother of King Louis Philippe), the Marquis de Choiseul, and the Chancellor de Aguesseau, among many others. In 1776, she received her first royal commission, to paint the portrait of the Comte de Provence (the future King Louis XVIII).