Portrait of Marc-René, marquis de Voyer d'Argenson (1722–1782)

Marc-René de Voyer d'Argenson, Marquis d'Argenson, was a senior French official and collector, the son of the more famous René Louis de Voyer d'Argenson who served as Foreign Minister. The younger d'Argenson was himself a cultivated figure, patron of the arts and collector of prints and drawings. La Tour's 1753 pastel, in the Musée Antoine-Lécuyer, depicts him at thirty-one, at the outset of what would be a long career in French administrative and cultural life. The d'Argenson family's engagement with the arts made them natural patrons for La Tour, whose position in French cultural life placed him in contact with the great ministerial families of Louis XV's reign.

Pastel on paper, with La Tour's mature analytical technique applied to a young aristocrat of the administrative noblesse. Formal dress signals rank without the full complexity of court costume, allowing La Tour to balance compositional richness with his characteristic concentration on the sitter's face.