Bathsheba with King David's Letter

[1][2] It is known to have been in the collection of Jean-Jacques-Joseph Leroy d'Etiolles, a renowned 19th-century surgeon, and then that of Louis Alfred Caroillon de Vandeul, mayor of Soisy-sur-Seine, who bequeathed it to the Louvre, where it still hangs.

[3][4] Many art historians hold it to be the painter's masterpiece, but others disagree - Wilhelm Valentiner called it sentimental, while Kunoth-Leifels considered it merely a pupil's attempt to imitate Rembrandt's introspective work which succeeded only as far as the limitations of Drost's technique allowed.

Werner Sumowski and Bruno Fucard argue that Drost was not trying to imitate Rembrandt's intensely introspective Bathsheba, but rather to produce a more purely aesthetic work without retreating from his master's style.

[6] He places her in a darker room than Rembrandt's 1645 treatment of the subject and only shows her upper body, but removes the background figures of the maids and limits his palette to just white, black and flesh tones.

[1] The concentric circles formed by the curves of Bathsheba's arms, the most important and fundamental element of the work, resonate with the circular motifs and soft textures of her undergarment, black necklace and round breasts.