William Louis Sonntag Sr. 1

Twilight in the Hills

19th Century

Oil on canvas, signed and dated depicting a glorious sunset in winter. Measures 28" x 34" including the frame. Edvard Axel Rosenberg (Swedish School, 1858-1934). In many ways Edvard Rosenberg...

Oil on canvas, signed and dated in the lower left corner. A tranquil painting featuring a European city on a lake or river at sunrise or sunset. Char...

A luminous Autumn oil on canvas board landscape, probably of the hills in the Hudson River Valley, by the noted American artist William Louis Sonntag (1822-1900). Signed in the lower right. Sonntag was born near Pittsburgh, PA and moved to Cincinnati, OH in the 1840’s to study art. He studied for a brief time with G. Frankenstein at the Cincinnati Academy of Fine Art and his idealized paintings of American wilderness and visionary paintings of imagined European ruins were commercially successful. He traveled twice to Europe in the 1850’s to improve his skills, eventually settling in New York City. He joined the National Academy of Design, where he exhibited his works for forty years. His mature works identify him with the Hudson River School of landscape painters. A romantic and naturalistic painter of his surroundings, Sonntag also created idealized paintings of Roman ruins, recalling his European trips of earlier years. Sonntag was an Associate (1860) and Academician (1861) at the National Academy of Design, and a member of the American Watercolor Society, Artists Fund Society, and the American Art Union...

American painting, Hudson river school, Oil on canvas.