René Théodore Berthon


René Théodore Berthon was a French painter of religious and historical subjects, and of portraits.

Life

Berthon was born at Tours in 1776, and studied under David. He painted scriptural and historical subjects, and a large number of portraits, which, although of no great merit, gained him a certain reputation in the days of the first empire and the restoration. Among his portraits are those of Napoleon I when First Consul, Pauline Bonaparte, Mademoiselle Duchesnois, and
Lady Morgan. Several of his historical pictures are at Versailles. He died in Paris in 1859.
His daughter, Sidonie Berthon, a miniature painter, was a pupil of her father and of Mme de Mirbel. She was born in Paris in 1817, and died in 1871.
'', portrait, now at the National Gallery of Ireland.
His son, George Théodore Berthon, was a portrait artist who emigrated to England and then to Canada.