Portrait de Madame Titon du Tillet, née Marguerite-Angélique Becaille (1656 - 1721)

This undated portrait of Madame Titon du Tillet—identified as Marguerite-Angélique Becaille, who lived from 1656 to 1721—held by the Musée des Beaux-Arts et d'Archéologie de Besançon, is associated with the circle of Évrard Titon du Tillet, the cultural impresario who created the famous Parnasse français, a monument celebrating French poets and musicians. The Titon du Tillet circle was at the centre of French cultural life in the early eighteenth century, and a portrait by Largillière of Titon du Tillet's wife would have been a natural transaction within this world of overlapping cultural ambitions. Given her dates (1656-1721), the portrait was most likely painted between roughly 1695 and 1720, placing it in Largillière's most productive period. Besançon's collection holds three Largillière portraits, suggesting deliberate regional collecting of his work.

A portrait of a woman associated with the cultural elite would have required Largillière to find a balance between the formal aristocratic portrait conventions and the more intimate intellectual identity of the sitter. His handling of complexion for a woman of the age range implied by the dates would have required attention to the specific tonal qualities of mature skin.