Painter Jean Fouquet + Agnès Sorel

Painter Jean Fouquet was so inspired by Agnès’s grand tetons that he used her as a model for his painting, The Virgin and Child Surrounded by Angels (c. 1450). Agnès, as the Virgin Mary, sits crowned on a throne, dressed in the iconic blue, an ermine cape around her shoulders and her bodice opened to reveal one milk-white breast the size of the infant Lord’s head.

Fouquet’s painting is one of many from the time period featuring the ‘nursing Madonna’ motif. His intention was not to make Agnès a 15th-century glamour model; rather, Agnès’s bust was used to represent the maternal sacred breast.

Conservative clergymen, already peeved with the king’s decision to make a court appointment for his mistress, were outraged that a woman known for her sexuality was used to portray the Holy Mother. Nevertheless, Agnès remained the king’s darling, a position that gave her authority to shake things up, though likely contributed to her untimely death.