Madame de Sérilly served as a lady-in-waiting to Queen Marie-Antoinette, a prestigious position in the court of Louis XVI. This portrait bust, dated 1780, was probably commissioned from Houdon to celebrate the occasion of the marriage of Anne-Marie-Louise de Pange de Domangeville to Antoine-Jean-François de Sérilly in 1779. Madame de Sérilly was about seventeen when the bust was made. Her husband was executed in 1794 during the French Revolution due to his support of the royal family. She remained imprisoned throughout the revolution. Houdon was the foremost French sculptor of portrait busts during the second half of the eighteenth century, depicting both royal subjects as well as artists, musicians and writers. In 1785 he traveled to the United States, where he sculpted busts of George Washington and other American political dignitaries.