In the early 1770s, in defiance of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Paris, she opened the gorgeous hôtel Guimard in the Chaussée d'Antin designed by Claude-Nicolas Ledoux in the latest neoclassical taste, decorated with paintings by Fragonard, and with a theater seating five hundred spectators.
The house was almost finished March 1773 when Grimm's Correspondance littéraire reported the famous anecdote of Fragonard's revenge:La Guimard had quarreled with the painter, who had depicted her as Terpsichore in large panels of her salon, and found a substitute.
Finding his way into the house unaccompanied, Fragonard picked up a palette of paints, and with a few deft touches transformed Mlle Guimard's Terpsichorean smile into a grimace of fury, without lessening in the least the likeness.
When La Guimard arrived with an entourage and discovered it, the angrier she became, the more she represented the new portrait.
In this Temple de Terpsichore, as she named it, the wildest orgies took place, according to her detractors.
In 1786 she was compelled to get rid of the property, and it was disposed of by lottery for her benefit for the sum of 300,000 francs.
In the early 1770s, in defiance of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Paris, she opened the gorgeous hôtel Guimard in the Chaussée d'Antin designed by Claude-Nicolas Ledoux in the latest neoclassical taste, decorated with paintings by Fragonard, and with a theater seating five hundred spectators. The house was almost finished March 1773 when Grimm's Correspondance littéraire reported the famous anecdote of Fragonard's revenge:La Guimard had quarreled with the painter, who had depicted her as Terpsichore in large panels of her salon, and found a substitute. Finding his way into the house unaccompanied, Fragonard picked up a palette of paints, and with a few deft touches transformed Mlle Guimard's Terpsichorean smile into a grimace of fury, without lessening in the least the likeness. When La Guimard arrived with an entourage and discovered it, the angrier she became, the more she represented the new portrait. In this Temple de Terpsichore, as she named it, the wildest orgies took place, according to her detractors. In 1786 she was compelled to get rid of the property, and it was disposed of by lottery for her benefit for the sum of 300,000 francs.
Marie-Madeleine Guimard