Artist. Andre Gill received notoriety as a 19th century French painter, who excelled in the field of drawing caricatures. Born Louis-Alexandre Gosset de Guînes, the illegitimate son of the Comte de Guines and Sylvie-Adeline Gosset, he studied at the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in Paris. He assumed the professional name of "Andre Gill" in honor of his hero, James Gillray, an eighteen-century English caricaturist. He began to draw caricatures for political satirical magazines including "Le Charivari", but was known mainly for his "Man of the Day" in the "La Lune," a four-page weekly newspaper, that ran from 1865 to 1868. When this newspaper was banned by the French government, he drew for the "L'Éclipse" from 1868 to 1876. Drawing hand-colored lithographic caricatures of various figures, he drew huge heads on the top of dwarf-sized bodies of politicians, military figures, actresses, musicians, authors, photographers, and many others. Most thought the drawings were not cruel but filled with humor, yet Napoleon III detested his intensively, closing the "La Lune." About the same time, a caricature of a pumpkin-headed judge, displeased the judge, who brought a lawsuit against Gill. Previously, he had drawn a caricature of Louis Philippe I of France as a pear-headed king with success. The lawsuit brought much attention to Gill's work, but he received a short sentence in jail. The attention brought his acceptance to the Bohemian art world of Paris, meeting many artists of the Realism Art Movement. In 1870 he became a charter member of the Federation of Artists, seeking freedom of expression. In May of 1871 he accepted a post as curator at the Musée du Luxembourg, successfully collecting art and sculpture for exhibits, shortly before the fall of the city during the Paris Commune. He published in the "La Rue" during the time. In September of 1871, his caricature of Adolphe Thiers, the second President of the French Republic, brought him attention. There was no freedom of the press during this time in history. To protest the banning of his art, he published in 1873 an attack against the government's censorship "L'Enterrement de la caricature" or "The Funeral of Caricature." This caricature presented an artist following a hearse, carrying a dog that was holding a pen and a paintbrush. In 1875 he drew "Le journaliste et l'avenir" or "The Journalist and the Future", in which a journalist is depicted bound and gagged. With his sources of publication being banned, in 1878 he became the editor of "La Lune rousse" for a short period before leaving to join with his Bohemian colleagues. On 29 July 1881, France changed its censorship laws, allowing that "any newspaper or periodic writing can be published." Known as a sharp mind with a sharp pen, his lifetime goal had been met. Besides his hundreds of caricatures, he did oil-on-canvas portraits, such as musical composer, Hector Berlioz, and artist, Joseph Félix Bouchor in 1879. In May of 1880 Gill's first child, a son named André-Louis-Jacques, was born. Celebrating the event, he painted an oil-on-canvas of the parents and newborn, and the painting is on display at the Musée du Petit Palais. His son died at age of six-months old, which may have added to his decline in mental health. Being abandoned by most of his colleagues after being diagnosed with mental illness in 1880, he declined rapidly over a five-year interval and died as a patient at Charenton, an insane asylum near Paris. Unlike many who died in the asylum, his remaining colleagues did provide him with a proper funeral and burial in a cemetery. In 1875 he painted a sign for a neighborhood nightclub of a rabbit jumping out of a saucepan; this sign, which is named "Lapin Agile," is still in place at this now famous night club in the 21st century. During his lifetime, he drew at least three self-portraits, showing the lack of freedom granted to him by the French government in his profession. He was not afraid to involve himself politically, by expressing humorously his loss as an artist during a turbulent and suppressive time in French history.