Joseph Fratrel, was a distinguished painter and etcher in France. Born at Épinal in 1730, he was a scholar of Baudouin in Paris. He became court painter for King Stanislaus and the Elector-Palatine Charles Theodore: in the Darmstadt Museum is a portrait of the Electress. He died at Mannheim on May 15, 1783. The following are his best-known works: