Or Foucquet Jean (c. 1420-c. 1481) French painter. He became court painter to Charles VIII 1448 and to Louis XI 1475. His Melun Diptych about 1450 (Musées Royaux, Antwerp, and Staatliche Museen, Berlin) shows Italian Renaissance influence.
He possibly trained in Paris, and was an accomplished master when he visited Italy, c. 1445, having already painted his famous portrait of Charles VII (Louvre). His art was admired in Rome, where he painted the portrait of Pope Eugene IV and evidently studied Italian Renaissance art with profit. He produced exquisite miniatures, notably those for a Book of Hours for his patron, Étienne Chevalier, Charles VII’s treasurer (Chantilly, Musée Condé), a Boccaccio (Munich) and historical compilations, Jewish and French (Bibliothčque Nationale); but on a larger scale he showed a grandeur and firmness of design (with something of the quality of Gothic sculpture) as well as appreciation of human character, which are magnificently displayed in the Deposition, c. 1466, of the Church of Nouans. Another masterpiece was the diptych, formerly in the cathedral of Melun, now divided into two parts, representing Étienne Chevalier and St Stephen (Berlin) and the Virgin and Child (Antwerp), the Virgin of the latter being probably an idealized portrait of the mistress of Charles VII, Agnes Sorel (of whose will Chevalier was an executor). National character is already mature in the work of this great artist, whose influence on his contemporaries may be gauged, for example, by the anonymous L’Homme au Verre de Vin of the Louvre.

(1615-1680) French politician, a rival to Louis XIV’s minister J-B Colbert. Fouquet became procureur général of the Paris parlement 1650 and superintendent of finance 1651, responsible for raising funds for the long war against Spain, a post he held until arrested and imprisoned for embezzlement (at the instigation of Colbert, who succeeded him).