(27 February 1824 - 17 July 1895) was a French painter born in Nantes.His oeuvre began with portraits and classical historical subject matter but he later moved on to allegorical and mythological themes.He was an academic painter and one of the founders of the Neo-Grec school, along with his close friends Gustave Boulanger, Jean-L??on G??rôme, and Jean-Louis Hamon, also academic painters. All of them studied in the workshops of both Paul Delaroche and later Charles Gleyre. Picou's style was noticeably influenced by Gleyre. While the rest of the group generally painted classical and mythological subjects, Picou also received commissions for large religious frescoes from many churches, including the Église Saint-Roch. His artistic debut was at the Salon in 1847. The next year he was awarded a second-class medal for his painting, Cl??opâtre et Antoine sur le Cydnus. Also known as Cleopatra on the Cydnus, it is commonly regarded as Picou's masterpiece. This showing at the Salon in 1848 was written about by the critic Th??ophile Gautier, who felt that the subject matter was too ambitious, but also said that "As it is, it gives the best hope for the future of the young artist, and ranks among the seven or eight most important paintings of the Salon.In 1875 the painting was exhibited in New York, and afterward found lodgment on the walls of a private art gallery in San Francisco.Picou maintained a large workshop in Paris on the Boulevard de Magenta, which provided him room to work on his expansive frescoes. His popularity continued to rise and he went on to win the Second Prix de Rome in 1853 for his painting, J??sus chassant les vendeurs du Temple (The Moneylenders Chased from the Temple), and another second-class medal for his Salon painting in 1857. From his debut in 1847, he was a regular at the Salon, showing almost every year until his final exhibit in 1893.He has been called the most fashionable painter towards the close of the Second French Empire  Related Paintings of Henri-Pierre Picou :. | The Dressing of the Favorite | Good adventure | At The Fountain | Jeu d'Echecs Indien | La Muse s'amuse |
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Alfred R. Waud
American, 1828-1891,was an American artist and illustrator, born in London, England. He is most notable for the sketches he made as an artist correspondent during the American Civil War. Before emigration, Alfred Waud had entered the Government School of Design at Somerset House, London, with the intention of becoming a marine painter. This did not come to fruition, but as a student, he also worked as a painter of theatrical scenery. He intended to pursue that work in the United States, when he immigrated in 1850, seeking employment with actor and playwright John Brougham. In the 1850s, he worked variously as an illustrator for a Boston periodical, the Carpet-Bag, and provided illustrations for books such as Hunter's Panoramic Guide from Niagara to Quebec (1857). The period during the American Civil War was time when all images in a publication had to be hand drawn and engraved by skilled artist. Photography existed but there was no way to transfer a photograph to a printing plate since this was well before the advent of the halftone process for printing photographs. Photographic equipment was too cumbersome and exposure times were to slow to be used on the battlefield. An artist such as Waud would do detailed sketches in the field, which were then rushed by courier back to the main office of the newspaper they were working for. There a staff of engravers would use the to sketches create finished engravings for publication. In 1860 Alfred Waud became an illustrator or special artist (a full time paid staff artist) for the New York Illustrated News. In April 1861, the newspaper assigned Waud to cover the Army of the Potomac, Virginia main Union army. He first illustrated General Winfield Scott in Washington, D.C., and then entered the field to render the First Battle of Bull Run in July. Waud followed a Union expedition to Cape Hatteras, North Carolina the next month. That autumn, he sketched army activity in the Tidewater region of Virginia. Waud joined Harper's Weekly toward the end of 1861, continuing to cover the war. In 1864 Alfred brother, William Waud (who up to that time had been working with Frank Leslie Illustrated Newspaper), joined Alfred on the staff of Harper's and they worked together during the Petersburg Campaign. Alfred Waud attended every battle of the Army of the Potomac between the First Battle of Bull Run in 1861 and the Siege of Petersburg in 1865. Alfred was one of only two artists present at the Battle of Gettysburg. His depiction of Pickett Charge is thought to be the only visual account by an eyewitness. Waud died in 1891 in Marietta, Georgia, while touring battlefields of the South.
James Otto Lewis
1799-1858
Arnold Boonen
Arnold van Boonen was a Dutch eminent portrait painter, was born at Dordrecht, in the Dutch Republic in 1669. He was first a scholar of Arnold Verbius, and was later instructed by Godefried Schalken. He painted genre pictures in the style of the latter, representing subjects by candlelight, but met with such encouragement in portrait painting that he devoted himself almost wholly to that branch of art. His style was well adapted to succeed in it. An excellent oolourist, a faithful designer of his model, and highly skilled, he was soon distinguished as one of the ablest artists of his day. He painted a great number of portraits of the most distinguished people of his time, among whom were Peter the Great, the Elector of Mentz, the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, the Prince and Princess of Orange, the great Duke of Marlborough, and several others. He painted some large pictures for the halls of the different companies at Amsterdam and Dordrecht. He died in 1729. The Dresden Gallery has seven works by him, and the 'Woman Singing' in the Lille Gallery is also attributed to him. His son, Kasper van Boonen, also painted portraits, but in no way proved himself equal to his father.