This portrait of the statesman Camille de Cavour was long attributed to Francesco Hayez (1791-1882), who had already painted another famous portrait of Cavour (1864) at the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan, but the one in the Château de Thorens was actually painted by Antonio Ciseri (1821-1891), an Italian painter of Ticino (Swiss) origin. An inscription on the back of the canvas formally attributes this work to Ciseri: "Ant: Ciseri fece a Firenze da una fottografia sul cadere del 1861" (translation: "Ant. [Antonio] Ciseri painted it in Florence from a photograph, towards the end of 1861").

However, for a long time, art historians were confused about this attribution, due to the particular caligraphy of Ciseri's name on the back of the painting. Since it was spelled with a long "s", they thought it was a character named "Ciferi". What's more, they couldn't read the abbreviation of the first name either: "Ant:" for Antonio and not for "Anti", as suggested. Some of them therefore searched in vain for a painter named "Anti Ciferi" who, of course, never existed.

Antonio Ciseri is renowned not only for the Raphaelesque style of his religious canvases, but also for the almost photographic realism of his works. This latter characteristic is inherent in this portrait of Cavour, about which Prof. Guichonnet wrote: "On an easel, in a carved and gilded frame, one of the most beautiful - the most beautiful without doubt - of Cavour's portraits. This oil shows the statesman of his last years, with graying hair and beard, amply shaped forehead, lively eyes behind glasses. That thin, ironic mouth looks as if it's about to come alive and speak. "In this painting, as Prof. Guichonnet suggests, the painter has focused on rendering reality and provoking the statesman's deepest feelings. When Ciseri painted this portrait from a photograph, Cavour, founder of Italian Unity, had left this world on June 6, 1861.