His father, Nicolas-Antoine Taunay, was also a painter, an aristocrat and a member of the then-newly founded Institut de France.

Taunay and his father left France after Napoleon Bonaparte's defeat, invited to go to Brazil by the Marquis of Marialva, Pedro José Joaquim Vito de Meneses Coutinho.

He became the academy's headmaster in 1834, and, in the following year, he was appointed as a young Emperor Pedro II's Greek, drawing and literature tutor.

During his final years of life, Taunay suffered from blindness, which made him retire prematurely.

Before dying, Taunay uttered "Adieu, belle nature du Brésil!