Marsden Hartley, born in 1877, began his studies at the age of 15 on a scholarship to the Cleveland School of Art. He continued on to the Chase School in 1898 and then to the National Academy of Design and the Art Students League in 1900, all located in New York City. Hartley was an early Modernist launched by Alfred Stieglitz at the 291 Gallery. From 1913 to 1915 Hartley traveled and lived in Berlin, creating created bold, expressionistic work. After 1918, Hartley's work turned to abstracted landscapes with powerful form and color. His mountain landscapes were produced in "stitch style", the Post-Impressionist brush style of Giovanni Segantini. Hartley also exhibited "Painting Number 5" (1914) with the Blaue Reiter (Blue Rider) group, which depicted motifs of military life in vivid symbolism. The last 12 years of Hartley's work consisted of a style uniquely his own, expressing emotion in blocky form and intense color.

Biography courtesy of The Caldwell Gallery, www.antiquesandfineart.com/caldwell