(1849 - 1907)
Théobald Chartran was born in Besançon, eastern France. He studied under Alexandre Cabanel at the École des Beaux-Arts, Paris. In 1877 he won the Prix de Rome. He painted miniatures, portraits, murals and historical and religious subjects, exhibiting in Paris from 1872 and in London from 1881. He lived for a time at 25 Bedford Street, off the Stand. Between 1878 and 1888 he contributed cartoons to ‘Vanity Fair’. In 1891 he painted the official portrait of Pope Leo XIII, who gave sittings at the Vatican. He travelled to New York in c.1896, where he painted portraits of Sarah Bernhardt, the daughter of Theodore Roosevelt and possibly Roosevelt himself. He was made Chevalier of the Legion of Honour before dying, aged 57, in Neuilly-sur-Seine.
