Lucius Rossi was an Italian portrait and figure painter who has worked and lived in Paris. He first followed an artistic training in the Roma’s Academy San Luca. Then he was strongly influenced by the imagination and the emotion of the Romantic painters, and also charmed by the technique of the Spanish artist Maria Fortuny, settled in Roma between 1857 and 1859.

Although a few details are known about his life, we know that he left Italy to settle in Paris in 1867, and began to work as a designer for magazines. For example, he worked for the English magazine The Graphic, and was close to the European high bourgeoisie. He painted some famous portraits including paintings of the William Waldorf Astor family, now in the coll...