Portrait de l´impératrice du Brésil, Tereza Cristina

Biard was one of the most important traveling artists of the nineteenth century. Born in Lyon, France, he graduated in Fine Arts. His work as a drawing teacher of the French Navy made possible a series of registration trips to European and African countries in the 1820s and 1830s. The artist landed in Brazil in 1858, where he remained for a year. His visit to the north of the country resulted in some records of daily scenes of indigenous peoples, as in “A fabricação do curare na floresta amazônica”, belonging to the Musée du Nouveau Monde in France.

In Rio de Janeiro, he portrayed members of the Portuguese court, as in “Portrait de l'impératrice du Brésil, Tereza Cristina”, belonging to Pinacoteca's collection and depicting Teresa Cristina de Bourbon-Duas Sicílias, the last Empress of Brazil. In 2010, 50 works by Biard were gathered at Pinacoteca for the exhibition “François Auguste Biard: o indígena e o olhar romântico”.