Mostly famed for her portraits, Elisabeth Louise Vigée-LeBrun played a seminal role in the development of pastel landscapes. The artist first applied herself to the genre upon her exile to continental Europe after the French Revolution in 1789. Returning to France from Switzerland in 1808, the artist brought with her "about two hundred pastel landscapes," by her own count, of which only approximately fifteen survive today. This rare example is characterized by its striking modernity. In taking up her pastels to immortalize the landscape, the artist inaugurated a practice that went on to flourish in the nineteenth century. Easy to handle and well-suited for excursions, pastel gradually overtook watercolor and oils as the most popular medium for executing landscapes.