Alphonse-Marie-Adolphe de Neuville 31 May 1835 – 18 May 1885 was a French academic painter who studied under Eugène Delacroix. His dramatic as living as intensely patriotic subjects illustrated episodes from the Franco-Prussian War, the Crimean War, the Zulu War, & portraits of soldiers. Some of his workings work been collected by the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg as well as by the Metropolitan Museum in New York.
Neuville participated in illustrating Pierre-Jules Hetzel's editions of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. He also illustrated Le Tour du monde and François Guizot's History of France. At the same time he painted a number of remarkable pictures: The Attack in the Streets of Magenta by Zouaves and the Light Horse 1864, A Zouave Sentinel 1865, The Battle of San Lorenzo 1867, and Dismounted Cavalry crossing the Tchernaia 1869. In these he showed peculiar insight into military life.
He reached the peak of his career after the revanchism: a deep sense of bitterness, hatred, and demand for revenge against Germany, particularly because of the destruction of Alsace and Lorraine. Paintings that emphasized the humiliation of the defeat were in high demand, such as The Spy by de Neuville.
In response, Neuville aimed at depicting episodes of the Franco-Prussian War in his works, and began by representing the Bivouac previously Le Bourget 1872. His fame spread rapidly and was increased by The Last Cartridges 1873, memorializing an episode involving the Blue Division of the French marines, in which it is easy to discern the vast difference between the conventional treatment of military subjects, as practised by Horace Vernet, and that of a man who had lived the life that he painted.
Fight on a Railroad 1874 was equally successful, and was followed by the Attack on a multiple at Villersexel 1875 and the Railway Bridge at Styring 1877. In 1878 but not at the ]
In 1881, he was presented an officer of the Légion d'honneur for The Cemetery of Saint-Privat, The Despatch-bearer, and Huns in the Battle of Chalon. During these years Neuville was at create with Édouard Detaille on an important although less artistic work, The Panorama of Rézonville.
Neuville died in Paris on May 18, 1885. At the sale of his workings the state purchased the paintings Bourget and Attack on a Barricaded House, as alive as watercolor The Parley and the drawing Turco in Fighting Trim, for the goal of displaying them at the Palais du Luxembourg.