Louis Le Breton (1818-1866)

Louis Le Breton (1818-1866) joined Dumont D' Urville's 1837-1840 French expedition to the Pacific as a junior surgeon, but after the death of official artist Ernest Goupil in Hobart in 1840, he was appointed artist for the remainder of the voyage. After returning to France he was given the task of producing the visual accounts of the voyage, an endeavor which took him seven years. During this time he submitted several of his most ambitious paintings inspired by the expedition to the Paris Salon.