Alexandre-Jean DUBOIS DRAHONET, was a French portrait painter, gouache painter, pastellist and engraver. He is better know for executed a great number of sketches of various national and military costumes but he also made history, genre scenes, nudes, portraits. Alexandre DUBOIS-DRAHONET was born in Versailles in 1791. He was a student and disciple of Neo-classical French master, Jean-Auguste-Dominique INGRES. He participated for the first time in the Paris Salon in 1812 by exhibiting "Ruins of Roman architecture" and "Interior of a ruined gallery". In 1817, "Fountain and remains of an ancient palace". In 1824, "Octogenarian leading his children to a Madonna to offer him flowers". In 1827, "Sketch of the Dieppe costumes" and "Full-length portrait of the Duchess of Berry" for which he obtained a medal of encouragement. He gets the favors of the Duchess of Berry of which he made the portrait on several occasions but also of her son, the Duke of Bordeaux in 1828. He painted the full-length portrait of the Duke of Bordeaux in the park of Saint Cloud, which enters directly after its realization at the museum of fine art of Bordeaux. In 1830, he produced a pair of portraits of King Francis I of the Two Sicilies and his second wife, Queen Marie-Isabelle, to commemorate their stay in Paris. This illustrious order definitively opens the doors to other orders from European royal courts. In 1832 DUBOIS-DRAHONET received an order from King William IV of England for one hundred paintings depicting officers of the English Army and the Navy, ninety-one of which are still in the Royal Collection in Windsor today. The goal of this commission was to paint a series of pictures illustrating recent changes in the uniforms and weapons of the British Army. During this official commission, the young artist painted the future Queen of England (Queen Victoria) when a girl. Our painter also produced a series on French Navy officers on a neutral white background, some of which are kept at the Musée de la Marine in Paris. One of them, the Portrait of General Gaspard Gourgaud, is kept at the Napoleonic National Museum on the Isle of Aix. The artist shows great attention to detail to describe the uniforms. But he was especially specialized in the art of portraiture, for which he showed a taste for the pure line, an assurance in his monumental compositions and a know-how in its plays of light and shadow, which bring it closer to the art of Ingres. He worked for Charles X and also for Louis-Philippe when duke of Orléans and after his accession. He died in Versailles in 1834. The museums of Amiens, Bordeaux, Amsterdam and even Haarlem keep some of his works.