Portrait of Madame de Noirmont as Diana

Painted around 1730, this portrait of Madame de Noirmont as Diana follows the tradition of mythological masquerade portraiture that had been fashionable in French and European court culture since at least the mid-seventeenth century. Diana—goddess of the hunt, identified with chastity, the moon, and woodland—was among the most common mythological identities assumed by aristocratic women in portrait-masquerades, partly because it allowed the sitter to appear in outdoor dress with flowing drapery and classical attributes without departing from a model of feminine virtue. Largillière was well practised in this form: the combination of accurate portraiture with classical or allegorical costume required careful balance between the sitter's individual features and the idealising conventions of divine iconography. The date of 1730 places the work in Largillière's late period, when his technique had softened slightly but his compositional authority remained complete.

The Diana portrait required Largillière to incorporate hunting attributes—bow, quiver, crescent moon, hound—alongside the sitter's individual likeness without allowing the allegorical elements to overwhelm the portraiture. His handling of classical drapery—heavier and more flowing than contemporary fashion—required a different brushwork approach from the stiff silks and satins of formal portraiture.