The bust was modeled and carved in Germany, but it is now held by the Elisabet Ney Museum in Austin, Texas, United States.

As a young artist in Berlin, Elisabet Ney had sculpted various luminaries of the city, including Jacob Grimm, Cosima Liszt, and Alexander von Humboldt.

Ney had been patronized by the naturalist Humboldt, sculptor Christian Rauch, and diplomat Varnhagen von Ense; when all three died between late 1857 and mid 1859, she decided to travel Germany in search of new notable subjects.

In the year after its completion, the marble was shown in Frankfurt, Berlin, and Leipzig (where Schopenhauer's publisher was located);[3]: 25  Ney also showed the work at the Paris Salon of 1861,[4] together with her portrait bust of Eilhard Mitscherlich.

[1]: 138  The eyes are lightly incised, and the head is slightly tilted, with an ambiguous expression; these details make the portrait more personal than Ney's earlier, more strictly neoclassical works.