Gilles-Louis CHRETIEN, born February 5, 1754 in Versailles and died March 6, 1811 in Paris, is a cellist, engraver and portrait painter, and the inventor of the physiognotrace, a new mechanical process for the execution of portraits. In 1785, he invented the physiognotrace and used it, from 1788, to the execution of portraits in Paris. In April 1788, he had joined forces with the miniature painter, Edme QUENEDEY, who lived at 45 rue des Bons-Enfants in Paris, for its exploitation. In the month of December 1789, CHRETIEN and QUENEDEY, made public, by a letter communicated to the Journal de Paris, their dissensions, before separating and continuing both to produce portraits with the physiognotrace. After this separation from QUENEDEY, CHRETIEN joined FOUQUET and FOURNIER to engrave his portraits, and settled in rue Saint-Honoré, no. 8 45 and 133, opposite the Oratory.