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Jean Béraud (1848 – 1935) was a French painter, born in Saint Petersburg. After the death of his father, who worked as a sculptor at Saint Isaac's Cathedral in that city, the family moved to Paris. There he began his training as a lawyer until the Franco-Prussian War broke out in 1870. He then opted for an artistic life and enrolled at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, where he trained with the famous portrait painter Léon Bonnat. Here Béraud was taught in the academic-naturalistic style and soon made his debut at the Paris Salon in 1872. He gained fame with his scenes from everyday life during the Belle Époque in a style that is somewhere between the academic art of the Salon and that of the emerging Impressionists. The Champs Élysées and other busy boulevards, the nightlife in the cafés on Montmartre and the Opéra, the banks of the Seine became his subjects. His work often shows a great sense of humor and he regularly mocks the lives of Parisians at the end of the 19th century. Gradually his style of painting became more and more impressionistic, but while his fellow Impressionists at that time left for the outskirts of Paris to depict country life, Béraud, like his friend Édouard Manet, remained faithful to the cityscape.
Béraud was best known for his 'À la salle Graffard', technique that he used for a visual effect on his genre paintings and that would be adopted by many painters. The upper part of the painting was painted in a light haze, figures/spectators were depicted in the foreground, while other people stood out against a darker background. From 1900 onwards, Béraud painted less and less and took a seat on numerous art committees, such as the Salon de la Société Nationale. He enjoyed great respect in Paris and was awarded an appointment in the Legion of Honor in 1894. Béraud was buried next to his mother and twin sister at Montparnasse.
