After Henry Mosler (German American, 1841-1920), A Village Lecture

Oil on canvas, unsigned, framed.

Stretcher size 38 x 58 1/4 in.; Frame dimensions 48 x 68 in.

Estate of Mr. And Mrs. John R. Hildebrand, Salem, Virginia

Henry Mosler was a Prussian-born American painter celebrated for his accomplished genre scenes, portraits, and historical subjects. Born into a Jewish family, he immigrated to the United States in 1849 and settled in Cincinnati, where he studied with James Henry Beard. During the Civil War, Mosler worked as an artist-correspondent for Harper’s Weekly, documenting Union campaigns in the Western Theater. He later continued his artistic training in Düsseldorf, Paris, and Munich.

Mosler eventually settled in France, where he achieved particular success with sensitively observed scenes of Breton peasant life. His painting Le Retour, exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1879, became the first work by an American artist purchased by the French government for the Luxembourg Gallery. After receiving numerous international honors, Mosler returned to the United States in 1894 and established a studio in New York, where he continued to paint historical and rural genre subjects until his death.

Mosler's work is represented in numerous public collections, including The Johnson Collection, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. In 2022, the Cincinnati Art Museum honored his legacy with the exhibition Henry Mosler Behind the Scenes: In Celebration of the Jewish Cincinnati Bicentennial, highlighting his place within the history of Jewish life and culture in Cincinnati.

Several patches to verso with associated retouch to recto visible under UV light; minor rubbing to frame.