François Flameng (1856-1923) was a French Post-Impressionist painter and engraver, born in Paris on December 6, 1856. He studied at the Lycee Louis le Grand and the Ecole des Beaux Arts, where he later became a professor in 1905. He died in Paris on February 28, 1923, a year after Hearst purchased Fete Nocturne, which is in the Albany Museum of Art’s Permanent Collection. The painting, a gift of Mr. and Mrs. Maurice D. Gortatowsky, once hung in Heart’s San Simeon estate, or Hearst Castle, in California. Jake Gortatowsky, the donor’s uncle and an Albany native, worked for Hearst’s New York newspaper and frequently visited San Simeon. Hearst gave Jake Gortatowsky the painting after hearing him say on many occasions that one of the women in the painting reminded him of his wife, Sadie.