Raoul Rigault, one of the most militant figures of the 1871 Paris Commune, is depicted here in a carte-de-visite albumen print produced by the celebrated Parisian studio Etienne Carjat & Cie at 10, Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette. Carjat relocated his studio to Rue Notre-Dame-de-Lorette during the years from the 1870s into the 1890s, placing this portrait squarely within the period of Rigault's prominence. Carjat, a caricaturist turned photographer, was renowned for his portraits of the artists and intellectuals of the Second Empire.

The subject appears in a dark double-breasted frock coat with visible buttons along the front placket and lapels, wearing a loosely knotted cravat over a white shirt with an open collar. He sports a full, dense beard and a mustache, and metal-framed oval pince-nez glasses rest low on his nose. The pose is a three-quarter bust within an oval vignette, the subject's gaze directed upward and to the left with an assertive, unsettled expression.

Raoul Adolphe Georges Rigault was born 16 January 1846 in Paris and died 24 May 1871, also in Paris, a journalist and French Socialist revolutionary best known for his role during the Paris Commune. He was appointed to the Prefecture of Police on 20 March 1871 and to the Commission of General Security on 29 March 1871. He was shot on 24 May 1871 near the Panthéon, having served as delegate to the General Security commission and as prosecutor of the Paris Commune, of which he was also an elected member.

The reverse bears the ornate purple studio imprint of Etienne Carjat & Cie, citing medals awarded at London 1861, Paris 1863–1864, Berlin 1865, and the Exposition Universelle of 1867. Inscribed in pencil at the top of the reverse: "Raoul Rigault / 1846–1871" ("Raoul Rigault / 1846–1871"); inscribed at the bottom: "Chief of Police P. Commune / Shot and Killed May 24, 1871."