Johann Georg Wille "Maurice de Saxe". 1745. Johann Georg Wille1715 Biebertal b. Giessen - 1808 Paris Hyacinthe Rigaud 1659 - 1743 Engraving on handmade paper. Inscribed "Gravé par Petit" as well as "par Hiacinthe Rigaud [...]" in the plate below the depiction. Titled below the portrait medallion "Maurice Comte de Saxe, Duc de Courlande et de Semigalle [...]". Clear yellowish stains at upper and lower margin. Creased and with a tear at the left margin (ca. 0.5 cm). Verso foxed and with two small paper remnants of an older mounting. Dimensions: pl. 47 x 34 cm, sheet 49.2 x 36 cm. Johann Georg Wille 1715 Biebertal b. Gießen - 1808 Paris German engraver. Wille first learned the gunsmith's trade in his birthplace and became acquainted with the engraver Georg Friedrich Schmidt in Strasbourg. Together with Schmidt he went to Paris and was encouraged by the painter Hyacinthe Rigaud to try his hand at engraving. The first print that made him famous was the portrait of Marshal Louis-Charles-Auguste Fouquet de Belle-Isle. Soon he engraved for the most famous French painters their works. He also executed engravings after pictures of older masters. Wille was court copper engraver to the King of France, the German Emperor and the King of Denmark. In 1746 he visited Germany, but returned to Paris in 1747. Many important engravers, among them J. G. von Müller, Charles Clément Bervic, Jakob Matthias Schmutzer, Dunker, Heinrich Guttenberg and François Robert Ingouf, were his pupils. Napoleon I appointed him knight of the Legion of Honour.