Joseph Karl Stieler was a German painter. From 1820 until 1855 he worked as royal court painter for the Bavarian kings. He is known for his Neoclassical portraits, especially for the Gallery of Beauties at Nymphenburg Palace in Munich, as well as his emblematic portrait of Ludwig van Beethoven, which has become one of his most famous works.

The Gallery of Beauties is a collection of 38 portraits of the most beautiful women from the nobility and bourgeoisie of Munich, Germany, gathered by Ludwig I of Bavaria in the south pavilion of his Nymphenburg Palace. All but two of the portraits were painted between 1827 – 1850 by Joseph Karl Stieler, with two additional portraits created by Friedrich Dürck, a student of Stieler's. The collection's best-known works are the portraits of the shoemaker's daughter Helene Sedlmayr, the actress Charlotte von Hagn, Marianna Marquesa Florenzi, and Eliza Gilbert. They also include a Briton, a Greek, a Scot and an Israelite, along with relations of Ludwig's – the wife and daughter of Ludwig of Oettingen-Wallerstein were both painted, as was Ludwig I's daughter Princess Alexandra of Bavaria. All 38 women pictured were rewarded for modeling by Ludwig I. He took over their dowry, paid them an allowance or found them a job at court. He remained in active correspondence with some of them for years, while others only briefly crossed his life.