ABSTRACT
The portraits produced of the princesses de Lamballe after her arrival in France positioned her firmly within the bosom of her new family, depicting her first as a dutiful and attractive wife, with maternal inclinations, then as a grieving and docile widow. The princess's first experience of portraiture was the highly formal style adopted by the House of Savoy and the First Families of the Piedmont region, epitomised by portraits of the family of the King of Sardinia. Maria Teresa was a Savoia-Carignano princess, a cadet branch of the House of Savoy, which had established a rival court to that of the king, with its 'own precinct of influence'. In 1864, the historian Mathurin de Lescure described a portrait of Lamballe as a young girl, in the Palazzo Reale in Turin. Certainly one of the most significant early portraits produced of the young Maria Teresa would have been the betrothal portrait sent to her intended husband, as was the custom.
