[3] Although Ingres's chief source of income came from portraiture, it distracted from his main interest in history painting, which early in his career, was far less lucrative.

[6] Influenced by the working methods of Jacques-Louis David, Ingres began with a number of nude preparatory sketches, for which he employed professional models.

He built up a picture of the sitter's underlying anatomical structure, as seen in the Musée Bonnat study, before deciding how to build the lavish costume and accessories.

[6] Although there is no surviving record of the commission, and the exact sequence of events is uncertain, the sketches can be dated from 1850, the year the style of her evening dress came into fashion.

Ingres's usual technique was to use sketches both to plot the final work and to provide guidance for assistants on whom he relied to paint in the less important passages.

[13] There is a full-length study of a nude standing in essentially the final pose, in which Ingres experimented with two different positions of the crossed arms.

[6] The painting's central motifs were already established in the earliest studies, in which her oval face, arched eyebrows, and habit of folding her arms with one stuffed into the opposing sleeve appear.

"[6][15] The Princesse de Broglie is shown in three-quarters view, her arms resting on a lavishly upholstered, pale gold damask easy chair.

Her neck is unusually elongated, and her arms seem boneless or dislocated, while her left forearm appears to be under modeled and lacking in musculature.

[19] The costume and decor are painted with a supreme precision, crispness and realism that art historians have compared to the work of Jan van Eyck.

[22] In many ways the painting is austere; art historian Robert Rosenblum describes a "glassy chill", and "astonishing chromatic harmonies that, for exquisite, silvery coolness, are perhaps only rivaled by Vermeer".

[19] The precisely rendered details and geometric background create an impression of immobility, though subtle movement is implied by the tilt of her head and the shimmering folds of her dress.

[26] The current frame measures 157 × 125.6 cm at the exterior and is made of pink-orange pine,[27] lined with a garland of gilt-plastered ornament flowers.

It was produced in the United States between 1950 and 1960 (around the time the Metropolitan acquired the work) in the French Louis XIII style fashionable in Ingres's period.

[27] The painting remained in Ingres's possession until 1854,[28] when it was first exhibited that December in his studio, alongside his unfinished Madame Moitessier (c. 1844–1856), Portrait of Lorenzo Bartolini, and c. 1808 Venus Anadyomene.

[29] One critic wrote that the painting showed Pauline as "refined, delicate, elegant to her finger tips ... a marvelous incarnation of nobility.

G., and representing a minority, academic view, describes her as a "puny, wilted, sickly, woman; her thin arms rest on an armchair placed in front of her.

"[29] The majority of critics noted Ingres's attention to detail in describing her clothes, accessories and decor, and saw an artist at the height of his creativity, with a few invoking the precision of van Eyck.