the painting is one of the few portrait commissions ingres accepted at the time, as he was more interested neoclassical subject matter, which to his frustration was a far less lucrative source of income than portraiture. he had made a preparatory sketch and had begun an oil and canvas version two years earlier, but abandoned the commission when de broglie became pregnant and was no longer able to pose for the long periods he required, and she had anyway found interminable and "boring". the final work is signed and dated at the lower left.