The Salon of 1859 marked a pivotal moment in the evolution of modern French painting and a sharp break with tradition. It was the first Salon for Degas, Monet and Pissarro and also included the artists they counted as their inspiration, such as Delacaroix, Corot and Daubigny. 1859 showed history painting, long considered the acceptable Salon “subject machine,” slowly being replaced by genre and landscape. Paul Baudry’s entries in 1859 provided a sampling of former successful Salon themes: religious scenes, mythological subjects and portraits. The Salon critics were harsh in their commentary on all but his portraits (Wolfgang Drost and Ulrike Henninges, ed., Théophile Gautier, Exposition de 1859, Heidelberg, 1992, p. 233-36), and his Portrait of Guillemette de Lareinty was praised by the critics for its “impressionistic” brushwork and charm. Baudry’s portrait of this well-to-do young girl (she would later become Marquise of Paris), so uncharacteristic from his trademark Academic style, reveals that he was not immune to the shift that was occurring in the 1850’s, starting with the daring new brushwork of Courbet. But, perhaps of greater significance for this change in Baudry’s style was the influence that earlier Spanish masters were having on French painting at this time. In fact, in his review of the 1859 Salon, Charles Baudelaire singled out Baudry’s portrait: “Although his [Baudry’s] painting is not always sufficiently solid, M. Baudry is more naturally an artist. In his works one detects sound and loving Italian studies, and that figure of a little girl called, I think, Guillemette, had the honor of reminding more than one critic of the witty, lively portraits of Velázquez.” (Charles Baudelaire, Œuvres completes, ed. by Claude Pichois, vol. II, Paris, 1975-76, p. 647).