Edward Henry Potthast (June 10, 1857 – March 9, 1927) was an

American Impressionist American Impressionism was a style of painting related to European Impressionism and practiced by American artists in the United States from the mid-nineteenth century through the beginning of the twentieth. The style is characterized by loose ...

painter. He is known for his paintings of people at leisure in

Central Park Central Park is an urban park between the Upper West Side and Upper East Side neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City, and the first landscaped park in the United States. It is the List of parks in New York City, sixth-largest park in the ...

, and on the beaches of New York and New England.

Life and work

Edward Henry Potthast was born on June 10, 1857, in

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ; colloquially nicknamed Cincy) is a city in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking River (Kentucky), Licking and Ohio Ri ...

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

, to Henry Ignatz Potthast and Bernadine Scheiffers. Starting in 1870 he studied art at the McMicken School in Cincinnati and in 1873 he started working at the Strobridge Lithography Company. From June 10, 1879, to March 9, 1881, Potthast studied under Thomas Satterwhite Noble, a retired Confederate army captain who had studied with

Thomas Couture Thomas Couture (; 21 December 1815 – 30 March 1879) was a French history painter and teacher. He taught many notable contemporary figures of the art world, such as Édouard Manet, Henri Fantin-Latour, John La Farge, Pierre Puvis de Chava ...

in Paris. Potthast later studied at the Royal Academy in

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

with the American-born instructor Carl Marr. After returning to Cincinnati in 1885 he resumed his studies with Noble. In 1886, he departed for

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

, where he studied with

Fernand Cormon Fernand Cormon (; 24 December 1845 – 20 March 1924) was a French painter born in Paris. He became a pupil of Alexandre Cabanel, Eugène Fromentin, and Jean-François Portaels, and one of the leading historical painters of modern France. Biog ...

. In 1895 he relocated to

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

and remained there until his death in 1927. Until the age of thirty-nine Potthast earned a living as a

lithographer Lithography () is a planographic method of printing originally based on the immiscibility of oil and water. The printing is from a stone (lithographic limestone) or a metal plate with a smooth surface. It was invented in 1796 by the German ...

. The purchase of one of his paintings by the

Cincinnati Museum of Art The Cincinnati Art Museum is an art museum in the Eden Park neighborhood of Cincinnati, Ohio. Founded in 1881, it was the first purpose-built art museum west of the Alleghenies, and is one of the oldest in the United States. Its collection of o ...

may have encouraged him to abandon lithography for a career as a fine artist.Orlando Museum
/ref> His paintings retained the subdued colors and strong contrasts of the Munich school until he adopted the Impressionist palette late in his career. After his arrival in New York Potthast worked as a magazine illustrator, and exhibited regularly at the

National Academy of Design The National Academy of Design is an honorary association of American artists, founded in New York City in 1825 by Samuel Morse, Asher Durand, Thomas Cole, Frederick Styles Agate, Martin E. Thompson, Charles Cushing Wright, Ithiel Town, an ...

, the

Society of American Artists The Society of American Artists was an American artists group. It was formed in 1877 by artists who felt the National Academy of Design did not adequately meet their needs, and was too conservative. The group began meeting in 1874 at the home of ...

and the

Salmagundi Club The Salmagundi Club, sometimes referred to as the Salmagundi Art Club, is a fine arts center founded in 1871 in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan, New York City. Since 1917, it has been located at 47 Fifth Avenue. , its membership rost ...

, winning numerous prizes. By 1908 he was installed in a studio in the Gainsborough Building. Thereafter he painted sun-saturated images of Central Park, New England landscapes, and the

Long Island Long Island is a densely populated continental island in southeastern New York (state), New York state, extending into the Atlantic Ocean. It constitutes a significant share of the New York metropolitan area in both population and land are ...

beach scenes for which he is best remembered. His work is included in many major museums in the United States, including the Orlando Museum of Art, the

Brooklyn Museum The Brooklyn Museum is an art museum in the New York City borough (New York City), borough of Brooklyn. At , the museum is New York City's second largest and contains an art collection with around 500,000 objects. Located near the Prospect Heig ...

, the Cape Ann Museum, the

Delaware Art Museum The Delaware Art Museum is an art museum located on the Kentmere Parkway in Wilmington, Delaware, which holds a collection of more than 12,000 objects. The museum was founded in 1912 as the Wilmington Society of the Fine Arts in honor of the arti ...

, the

University of Michigan Museum of Art The University of Michigan Museum of Art (UMMA) is one of the largest university art museums in the United States, located in Ann Arbor, Michigan, with . Built as a war memorial in 1909 for the university's fallen alumni from the Civil War, Alu ...

, the

Phoenix Art Museum The Phoenix Art Museum is the largest art museum, museum for visual art in the southwest United States. Located in Phoenix, Arizona, the museum is . It displays international exhibitions alongside its comprehensive collection of more than 18,0 ...

, the Nasher Museum of Art, and the

Virginia Museum of Fine Arts The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA) is an art museum in Richmond, Virginia, United States, which opened in 1936. The museum is owned and operated by the Commonwealth of Virginia. Private donations, endowments, and funds are used for the supp ...

Gallery

File:Potthast-coney-island.jpg, Edward Henry Potthast ''Coney Island,'' c. 1914 File:Edward Henry Potthast - Summer day, Brighton Beach.jpg, Edward Henry Potthast Summer day, Brighton Beach File:Potthast-july.jpg, Edward Henry Potthast ''A July Day'', oil, 1914 File:Happy Days Edward Henry Potthast.jpeg, Edward Henry Potthast ''Happy Days'', oil on panel, c. 1910–1920

References

Edward Henry Potthast, American Impressionist: Selections from the Gross Family Collection
Retrieved 3-25-10

External links

Edward Henry Potthast Biography: Hollis Taggart Galleries

www.EdwardHenryPotthast.org
118 works by Edward Henry Potthast
American paintings & historical prints from the Middendorf collection
an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Potthast (no. 50) {{DEFAULTSORT:Potthast, Edward Henry 1857 births 1927 deaths 19th-century American painters American male painters 20th-century American painters American Impressionist painters Painters from Cincinnati Academy of Fine Arts, Munich alumni 19th-century American male artists 20th-century American male artists

Life and work

Gallery

References

Further reading

External links