Artwork Page for Portrait of Cardinal Guillaume Dubois

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Portrait of Cardinal Guillaume Dubois

1723
(French, 1659–1743)
Measurements
Framed: 180.5 x 148 x 15 cm (71 1/16 x 58 1/4 x 5 7/8 in.); Unframed: 146.7 x 113.7 cm (57 3/4 x 44 3/4 in.)
Credit Line
Public Domain
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Description

With his luxurious, flamboyant dress—a voluminous wrap of scarlet silk topped by a short fur cape—the subject of Hyacinthe Rigaud’s portrait was clearly a man of consequence. Guillaume Dubois gained the favor of Louis XIV as tutor to his nephew, Philippe Charles, Duke of Orléans, and served as chief minister under Louis’s successors, the regent Duke of Orléans and Louis’s great-grandson, Louis XV. Dubois was appointed a Cardinal in the Catholic Church in 1721, a lofty aspiration at least partly motivated by political ambition: the title gave him the ability to remove political adversaries with impunity. Dubois holds a letter with the words Au Roy (to the king); this portrait was painted in the same year the young Louis XV ascended to the throne.
A vertically oriented naturalistic oil painting depicts Cardinal Guillaume Dubois, a man with light skin tone seated looking towards us in an ornate gold chair. He wears a white, ermine-trimmed cape over a voluminous, red silk robe with delicate lace sleeves. He holds a red, tasseled hat in his right hand and an envelope inscribed "Au Roy" in his left. To our right, books sit on a table. A dark curtain drapes the background.

Portrait of Cardinal Guillaume Dubois

1723

Hyacinthe Rigaud

(French, 1659–1743)
France, 18th century

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