Anne-Louis de Tousard
Charles Balthazar Julien Févret de Saint-Mémin
1800
ink
From the collection of National Gallery of Art
Charles Balthazar Julien Févret de Saint-Mémin
1800
ink
From the collection of National Gallery of Art
This portrait shows a man in a crisp military coat with shiny buttons. His shoulder has a thin gold braid, called an epaulette. The artist used a dark, smoky style called mezzotint, where the ink does the shading for you. Mezzotint was big in the late 1700s. It made portraits look almost three-dimensional. This print comes from a copper plate, pressed onto paper. Want to see more of this guy’s work? Look up Saint-Mémin, Charles B. J. Févret de.
