Marie-Antoinette in Pop Culture

Just for a little bit of fun, here’s a tidbit of Marie-Antoinette in popular culture. Hole, Courtney Love’s band, released nobody’s daughter in April this year. The album cover (aside from a spiffy parental advisory label) shows (most of) a portrait of Marie-Antoinette.

This particular portrait (history lesson alert!) is a redone version of the painting of the queen in her white muslin dress, known as en gaulle. People were so scandalized by the portrait because it looked as though the queen had been painted in her undergarments. The painter, Elizabeth Vigee-Le Brun, reworked it with this pretty blue gown and a different hat.

With a touch of wit, the portrait is–ahem–cut off at the neck. Turn the CD over, and the back cover is of Anne Boleyn given a similar cropping. I guess being queen can be a dangerous occupation if you aren’t careful.