Portrait de Charles-Louis-Auguste Fouquet, duc de Belle-Isle (1684-1761), maréchal de France

Charles-Louis-Auguste Fouquet, duc de Belle-Isle, was Marshal of France and one of the most significant military-political figures of Louis XV's reign, playing a major role in French strategy during the War of the Austrian Succession and later the Seven Years' War. La Tour's 1748 portrait in oil on canvas — now in the Musée Carnavalet — was made at a moment of high military consequence, shortly after the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle brought the War of the Austrian Succession to a close. Oil on canvas was the appropriate medium for so formal and senior a military official, and the Carnavalet Museum — devoted to the history of Paris and France — is a natural repository for an image of such historical significance.

Oil on canvas, with La Tour's analytical precision applied to the challenge of rendering a Marshal's full dress. Military uniform, insignia, and decorations are documented with the care of a historical record as much as a portrait. The face carries the authority of high command without theatrical exaggeration.