Biography

Count D'Orsay was a fashionable dandy who was also a talented amateur artist. Born in Paris, the son of one of Bonaparte's generals, the famously handsome D'Orsay travelled around Europe with the Blessingtons, variously attached to Lord Blessington, Blessington's daughter, to whom he was briefly married, and Lady Blessington. After Lord Blessington died in 1829, D'Orsay and Lady Blessington established a fashionable artistic and literary circle in London. He made portrait drawings, oils and busts of his society friends. Eventually the money ran out and D' Orsay left for France, dying in Dieppe of a spinal infection.