
Collection Online as of March 20, 2023
(French, 1727–1775)
Oil on canvas
Bequest of John L. Severance 1942.638
216B French and German
Like many French portraitists active during the ancien régime, François-Hubert Drouais was skilled at veiling the physical imperfections of his subjects. This portrait certainly has this quality: the face has been idealized, smoothed, and perfected, but the focus of the painting is less on the Marquise and more on her elegant gown, which is a particularly fine rendering of eighteenth-century printed cloth, with the brilliant gold and white fabric strewn with meticulously detailed flowers and lace.