Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Baron, Bernard
BARON, BERNARD (d. 1762), engraver, son-in-law and pupil of Nicholas Tardieu, was born in Paris about 1700. He came to London with Dubosc and other engravers. In 1729 he returned for a short while to Paris, and there engraved a plate after Watteau, and sat for his portrait to Vanloo. He engraved a vast number of works. Heineken mentions Vandyck, Kneller, Hogarth, Rubens, Titian, Watteau, David Teniers, Gravelot, and Vanloo, with many more, as artists whose works were reproduced by Baron. Amongst the best of his engravings may be mentioned ‘The Family of the Earl of Pembroke’ (1740), ‘King Charles I on horseback, with the Duke d'Epernon’ (1741), ‘The King and Queen, with two Children,’ and the ‘Nassau family,’ all after Vandyck. He lived the greater part of his life in London, and died there, in Panton Street, Haymarket, 22 Jan. 1762. He engraved in a rough bold manner, with little precision. There are five of his prints in the ‘Recueil des Nations du Levant,’ and some more in Dalton's ‘collection of Antique Statuary.’
[Dussieux's Les Artistes Français à l'étranger; Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting, iii. 979; Strutt's Dict. of Engravers; Heineken's Dictionnaire des Artistes; Füssli's Künstler-Lexicon, 1806; Bryan's Dict. of Painters and Engravers; Nagler's Künstler-Lexicon, 1835; Huber and Rost's Handbuch für Kunstliebhaber und Sammler, viii. 99.]