Melchers, Gari

▪ American artist

born Aug. 11, 1860, Detroit

died Nov. 30, 1932, Falmouth, Va., U.S.

      highly successful portrait and genre painter. Melchers, who worked extensively in both the U.S. and Europe, achieved an international reputation. When he was 17 he went to Düsseldorf, Ger., to study at the Royal Art Academy, and three years later he went to Paris to the Académie Julian and the École des Beaux-Arts. Attracted by the picturesque quality of The Netherlands, he settled at Egmond aan Zee, where he portrayed genre scenes (e.g., milkmaids in the fields, and villagers in church). “The Sermon” from this period brought him honourable mention at the Paris Salon of 1886. An academic painter of great technical ability, he executed, in addition to his genre painting, portraits, landscapes, still lifes, and religious works. In his later works he devoted himself to murals and portraits (e.g., “Peace and War,” Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.; and “President Theodore Roosevelt,” Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.).

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