Rosalind Polly Blakesley

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237 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 23 Jul

Rosalind Polly Blakesley’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.

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In Our Time · Vigée Le Brun · 23 Jul 2026 podcast

But we know from letters to, for example, Baron von Grimm that the Empress really did take against it.

So she was asked to repaint it.

And in her memoir, she implies that it was just, you know, a little bit of an adjustment and adding some sleeves.

She'd portrayed them initially in tunics and she gives them lovely long sleeves that then the Empress is satisfied.

But actually, X-rays show that there are no changes to the painting as it survives.

So she did paint it afresh.

And that was the sort of thing you didn't want to get out there.

So she managed not, you know, she managed to sort of quash that story by pretending she just had to, you know, just a couple of small pentimenti and all was well.

She stays for six years.

She does incredibly well.

And she...

Very soon after the slightly ill-fated portrait of these young granddaughters, she portrays the wife of Catherine the Great's grandson, oldest grandson, a woman called Grand Duchess Elizaveta Alekseevna.

And this is another huge great state portrait that is superb.

I was a bit disobliging of one of the early ones of Marie Antoinette.

This one is absolutely fabulous.

And that is well received by the empress herself.

And they meet in the Winter Palace for the Empress to have a look at it and give her verdict.

And the verdict is given.

And again, in Vigée's memoirs, she says that in that meeting, Catherine was so impressed by it that slightly grudgingly, she says, everybody is saying that you should paint my portrait.

I will sit for you.

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