Charles Albert d'Arnoux (Bertall) Biography

Charles Albert d'Arnoux, known as Bertall (or Bertal, an anagram of Albert) or Tortu-Goth (1820-1882) was a French illustrator, engraver, caricaturist, and early photographer.

His father was a former war commissioner. His family wanted him to study at the Ecole Polytechnique, but he chose to study painting, and spent several years in the studio of Michel Martin Drolling, at the end of which he decided to devote himself exclusively to illustration and caricature. On the advice of Balzac, who mentored him, he began signing his works under the name of Bertall, an adjusted anagram of his middle name. He married Albertine Cesarine Elisabeth Pellapra de Lolle and became the father of triplets on 17 August 1866. He was made Knight of the Legion of Honor on 3rd February 1875.

He drew for Le Magasin pittoresque (fr), Musée des familles, La Semaine des enfants, Le Journal pour tous, La Bibliothèque des chemins de fer, and the Bibliothèque rose (fr). He provided 3,600 drawings for Les Romans populaires illustrés, published in 30 volumes by Gustave Barba between 1849 and 1855. He contributed numerous cartoons and comics to L'Illustration and La Semaine, the Journal pour rire (fr) and Le Grelot (fr). He also wrote and illustrated his own texts, including La Comédie de notre temps and La Vigne, voyage autour des vins de France.

A pioneer in photography, he collaborated with Hippolyte Bayard in 1855, then opened the Bayard and Bertall photography workshop (15 bis rue de la Madeleine, Paris) in the early 1860s until 1866. He started his own successful portraiture studio in 1866.