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This portrait was painted in Brussels just a few months after Henrietta of Lorraine (1611–1660) was banished from France. She was forced to flee Nancy, dressed as a man, after being accused of being a collaborator to treason. Henrietta of Lorraine was daughter of Count François de Vaudémont, nephew of duc Henri of Lorraine. In 1632 her younger sister, Margaret, secretly married Gaston, duc d'Orléans, the younger brother of King Louis XIII of France.
Van Dyck produced several portraits during his brief stay in the Southern Netherlands in 1634-35. In these he showed as much virtuosity and the same idiom as in the best of his English compositions.
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