Auguste BERTHON (1858-1917). Portrait of Henry de Rochefort, 1903. Pastel signed upper right, dated and located in Aix-les-Bains upper left (small tear at bottom, foxing). Bears two labels from Galerie Charpentier in Paris on the back. Height 67 cm - Width 55 cm Note: Victor-Henri de Rochefort-Luçay, Marquis de Rochefort is the descendant of a noble family ruined by the French Revolution. The son of a royalist journalist, he turned to writing early on, publishing small articles in newspapers such as Le Tintamarre, Le Charivari and Le Nain jaune, before joining Le Figaro in 1864, establishing his reputation as a polemical writer. In 1868, he launched the first issue of La Lanterne, an innovative political weekly that met with immediate and scandalous success, prompting him to emigrate to Belgium, where he continued to publish his magazine. He became host and friend to the poet Victor Hugo, also exiled in Brussels. Elected as a member of parliament in 1869, he founded a daily newspaper that same year, La Marseillaise, which attacked the Empire head-on. His articles published during the Commune led to his imprisonment in New Caledonia, from which he escaped and found refuge in the United States, then England, to launch a new magazine in 1874. Amnestied in 1880, he founded L'Intransigeant the following year and became an active anti-Dreyfusard.