Jules Grévy (1807–1891), a French lawyer and statesman, is shown here in an albumen carte-de-visite produced by Charles Reutlinger at his celebrated studio at 21, Boulevard Montmartre, Paris. The image dates to the period when Reutlinger was at the height of his Parisian career, almost certainly captured before 1880, when Charles Reutlinger retired from the business and entrusted the studio to his brother Émile. The reverse bears the studio's laureate imprint, reflecting Reutlinger's first prize at the Exposition Universelle of 1867.

Grévy is seated in three-quarter view before a plain tonal ground, wearing a dark double-breasted frock coat with a patterned bow tie at his collar. His left arm rests on an ornately carved table holding a stack of books, while his right hand falls loosely at his side. He is partially bald with a close-cropped salt-and-pepper beard, and his expression is composed and direct. A heavily carved, turned-spindle armchair is visible behind his right shoulder.

A committed republican parliamentarian, Grévy was arrested following the coup d'état of 1851, served as President of the National Assembly from 1871 to 1873 and President of the Chamber of Deputies from 1876 to 1879, and was subsequently elected President of the French Republic in 1879, reelected in 1885, before being forced to resign in the wake of the decorations scandal implicating his son-in-law, Daniel Wilson.

The reverse reads, in French: "Déposé / CH. REUTLINGER, PHOT. / Garanti d'après nature" (Registered / Ch. Reutlinger, Photographer / Guaranteed after life), with the studio's award medallion vignette citing prizes at Paris 1867, Berlin 1866, and Hamburg 1868, followed by a manuscript signature in ink reading "Grévy."