Two Naked Young People Seen From Behind (study For Happy Island), Engraving By Albert Besnard, 1899

Albert Besnard, painter, decorator and engraver; His parents were Louis Adolphe Besnard, a history painter and student of Ingres, and Louise Pauline Vaillant, a renowned miniaturist and student of Lizinska de Mirbel. Albert Besnard studied with Jean-François Brémond and was admitted on March 20, 1866 to the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, in the studios of Alexandre Cabanel and Sébastienelteil Cornu. In 1874, he won the Grand Prix de Rome with his composition La Mort de Timophane, tyran de Corinthe... No. 121 at Delteil, the first proofs of this plate are distinguished by the freshness of the copper scratches in the white parts of the background, printed on a fine laid paper with a watermark. Signed lower right, annotated lower left: printed at 75.