a Polish—and later German—painter and printmaker with Huguenot ancestry, who is most famous as an etcher. He spent most of his life in Berlin, and became the director of the Berlin Academy of Art. He was admitted to the Berlin Academy in 1764 and became vice-director under Bernhard Rode in 1788. He had found his true calling and became the most famous German graphic artist of his time. His works includes several thousand etchings, usually rather small, and many drawings and paintings. His book illustrations embrace almost all the great classics. His prints represent in great detail the life of the bourgeoisie during the Zopfstil period, a time between Rococo and Classicism.
