Although the representation of the identically dressed sisters suggests twinship, Adèle was thirty-three and Aline was twenty-one when they posed for the portrait.

Both sisters have fine, shiny dark hair parted in the middle and tied back in a bun.

The work is a product of Chassériau's early maturity, when he was eager to demonstrate his independence from his former master, Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, with whom he had had a falling-out in 1840.

Although classically trained under Ingres, Chassériau had become influenced by the Romantic master Eugène Delacroix, as evidenced in this case by the work's strong coloring.

One critic, Louis Peisse, wrote:M. Chassériau wanted, perhaps unnecessarily, to undertake a difficult thing, to do a painting with two figures of women, both full length, of the same height, both in dresses of the same color and the same fabric, with the same shawl, posed in the same manner, and to sustain that gamble of sorts without using any artifice of light or effect, solely through the authority of style, form, and character.