Bierstadt, Albert

(born Jan. 7, 1830, near Düsseldorf, Westphalia—died Feb. 19, 1902, New York, N.Y., U.S.) German-born U.S. painter of the Hudson River school. His parents immigrated to the U.S. when he was an infant. As a young man he traveled and sketched throughout Europe before returning to the U.S. to join a westward-bound expedition in 1859. Specializing in grandiose pictures of vast mountain scenery, he achieved great popularity in his lifetime with panoramic and often fanciful scenes of the American West, including The Rocky Mountains (1863) and Mount Corcoran (c. 1875–77). His huge paintings were actually executed in his New York City studio.

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