Albert Bierstadt was a German American painter best known for his lavish, sweeping landscapes of the American West.
Bierstadt was born in Solingen, Rhine Province, Prussia (now Germany) in 1830. He was just one year old when his family immigrated to New Bedford, Massachusetts in 1831.
Bierstadt began painting in oils in 1851 and later studied painting for several years in Düsseldorf, Germany. After returning to the United States in 1857, he briefly taught drawing and painting before devoting himself full-time to landscape painting.
Bierstadt was a prolific artist, having completed over 500 paintings during his lifetime. He joined several journeys of the Westward Expansion to paint the scenes of the American West, becoming the foremost painter of these landscapes for the remainder of the 19th century.
Bierstadt's style was based on carefully detailed paintings with romantic, almost glowing lighting, sometimes called "luminism". His work has been both praised for helping create support for the conservation movement and the establishment of Yellowstone National Park, as well as criticized as an imaginary depiction of nature.
Despite his success during his lifetime, Bierstadt was largely forgotten for nearly 60 years after his death in 1902. Interest in his work was renewed in the 1960s with the exhibition of his small oil studies.
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