Elise Brandes was a sculptor specializing in portrait busts. She is educated at Den Kgl. Drawing School in Kristiania (later Oslo), the Art School for Women, and from 1905–1906 at the Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen.

In December 1900, she marries the writer and politician Edvard Brandes, 26 years her senior. The couple settles in Copenhagen in a newly built villa, designed by Eugen Jørgensen, which, among other things, is furnished with a large studio for Elise. She models portraits of her husband, his brother Georg Brandes, Gustav Wied and other prominent people from literature and art - like the expressive portrait bust here of the silent film star Asta Nielsen.

Her most important exhibitions were Charlottenborg's Spring Exhibition 1906–1910 and The Baltic Exhibition in Malmö 1914. Some of the portraits are cast in bronze and are now displayed in public institutions, the cityscape and in the Vandresal of the Folketing and in Politiken's editorial office.