Jean Beraud was born in St Petersburg,the son of a French Sculptor, Béraud moved to Paris to complete his law studies at the Lycée Bonaparte. Afterwards he entered the studio of Léon Bonnat where his paintings were greeted with great enthusiasm and he was welcomed into Parisian society receiving many commissions for portrait paintings from famous figures such as the Prince d'Orleans and Prince Troubetskoy. He attended many of the evening soirees arranged by the popular hostesses of the time and showed these scenes in his paintings.Closely allied with the Impressionists,Jean Béraud would hold lengthy aesthetic discussions with his friend Edouard Manet. He frequented the same cafés, restaurants and theatres as Dégas, Renoir and Toulouse-Lautrec but although his paintings are imbued with the spirit of Impressionism he appears to combine this with the more classically accepted styles of the day to create paintings with a unique character.