Note: This self-portrait of the handsome young artist was passed on in the Isabey family with the oral tradition that it was executed approximately at the time of his wedding in 1791.

The extraordinary finish and the radiant beauty of the drawing seem to bear out the stroy of its history. Two years into the Revolution, Isabey, the former favorite of Marie-Antoinette, had nothing but his talent and his good looks to win the beautiful Jeanne Laurice de Salienne. Isabey had a hard time convincing her father that he would be able to support a wife. But within only a few years the artist made good his pormise of a great future. F. Gerard's Portrait of Jean-Baptiste Isabey and his Daughter (1795, Louvre) depicts the same handsome young artist as in the present drawing, a setting that speaks of artistic and social success.