Levi Wells Prentice
American, 1851-1935
Prentice grew up on a farm in Lewis County, New York By 1872, Prentice had traveled through the Adirondack Mountains, painting the views as well as the surrounding region. He opened his first studio as a landscape painter in Syracuse, New York in 1875.
Self-taught, Prentice is best known for his realistic still life compositions of fruit arranged within a landscape, or abundantly spilling from bushel baskets. Early in his career, he painted portraits and landscapes of the Adirondack Mountain region of Lewis County, New York, his birthplace. Prentice turned to painting still life subjects when he moved briefly to Brooklyn, New York in 1883, focusing on fruit. Prentice married an English woman, Emma Roseloe Sparks, in Buffalo, New York in 1882 and had two children. He moved around from 1903-07 before settling in the Germantown district of Philadelphia. However, his work did not gain much recognition with historians until the 1970s. He was a member of the Brooklyn Art Association and frequently exhibited his paintings there.
In addition to his artistic talents, he was a craftsman who enjoyed making his own brushes, palettes and frames.
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