An elderly Prince Alexander Mikhailovich Gorchakov sits for a bust-length portrait on this albumen silver CDV produced at the Paris studio of Alphonse Liébert. Gorchakov, born July 15, 1798, and died March 11, 1883, was among the most prominent statesmen of his era, and the card's 81 Rue Saint-Lazare address places the sitting within Liébert's studio at that address, active from 1872 to 1906. Given Gorchakov's death in 1883, the photograph dates to the decade between roughly 1872 and 1883.

The subject appears as a heavyset elderly man with close-cropped white hair, wearing round wire-rimmed spectacles and a dark coat over a white shirt with a broad, dark cravat tied in a generous bow at the throat. His gaze is directed slightly downward and to one side, the bust dissolving into a soft vignette against a plain light ground. The mount carries a double-rule border with teal blue ruling and the imprint "A. Liébert, Phot." printed along the lower front edge.

Gorchakov served as Russia's foreign minister during the quarter century following the Crimean War, when Russia was working to reassert itself as a dominant European power. In 1866, Tsar Alexander II elevated him to the post of imperial chancellor, making him the highest-ranking official in the Russian government after the tsar. Liébert, passionate about photography, built a long career capturing politicians, dignitaries, and cultural figures at his Paris studio, and this card stands as a rare photographic record of the Russian chancellor in the French capital.

The reverse bears the printed studio imprint "Photographie Américaine / A. Liébert / Breveté S.G.D.G. / 81, Rue St. Lazare, 81 / Près la Chaussée d'Antin / Au 1er Étage / Paris" (American Photography / A. Liébert / Patented S.G.D.G. / 81, St. Lazare Street, 81 / Near the Chaussée d'Antin / On the 1st Floor / Paris), along with the stamp of the distributor Maison Martinet / Hautecoeur Ainé. Inscribed in ink at the top of the reverse in two hands: "Pce Gortschakoff" and "Prince Gortschakoff" (Prince Gortschakoff).