Artists

Edward Henry Potthast
American, 1857-1927

Potthast was born June 10, 1857 in Cincinnati, Ohio, the son of working class, German immigrants Henry Ignatz Potthast (a chair and cabinet maker) and Berrnardina Scheifers (a milliner and helper-clerk) and grew up in Covington,  Kentucky.


He studied at the McMicken School with Thomas Noble (1870-1881); in Antwerp with Polydore Beaufaux and Charles Verlat (1881-1882); in Munich with Nikolaus Gysis (1882-1883), Ludwig vonLoefftz, Carl vonMarr and Alexander vonWagner (1883-1884); in Paris at the Academie Julian with Lefebvre and Boulanger (1885-1888), Cormon (1887) and possibly with Paul Laurens (1888); art lessons at the Cincinnati Art Academy (1887). 


Potthast’s brother named his son Edward Henry Potthast (1880-1941) and Potthast’s namesake became his student. Uncle and son painted together in Potthast’s New York City studio for years and traveled to Holland to paint there as well. The two men hung side by side at exhibitions starting in 1911, and when Potthast died his namesake inherited a great many of his paintings. Over the years both men’s canvases were intermingled and when the nephew died, all the paintings in the studio were sold, almost all bearing the same signature but having been painted by TWO men named Edward Henry Potthast.

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