Anthony Thieme

American, 1888 - 1954

(not assigned)Massachusetts, USA, North America

BiographyOne of the best-known plein-air American impressionist artists, Anthony Thieme claimed, "the open air is my studio". He was born on February 20, 1888 in Rotterdam, Holland and studied in Germany under George Hacker in Dusseldorf and later, in Turin, Italy, under the guidance of Giuseppe Mancini and Carlo Bini.

Thieme immigrated to America in 1917 and began painting Broadway backdrops in New York. He eventually settled in Rockport, Massachusetts where he established his studio and opened the Thieme School of Art, teaching from 1929 to 1943. While living in Rockport, Thieme began to create his signature impressionist- inspired views of the local harbor, streets, quarries, and the coastline.

Thieme's technique differs from most artists of his time period. While he worked in an Impressionist manner, he was also profoundly influenced by the Dutch seascape tradition, and was particularly interested in the effects of light on water, as seen here in the painting Colored Sails.

In 1946, Thieme's Cape Ann studio burned down, together with much of his work of the previous thirty years. Rather than rebuild his life in Massachusetts, Thieme moved on to explore new environments. His first stop was Charleston, South Carolina, where he spent two months in prolific activity, inspired by the revelation of light and color far more intense than that to which he had become accustomed.

Throughout his life, Thieme was an active traveler. He typically wintered in South Carolina, Guatemala, Mexico, and the Bahamas, as well as in St. Augustine, Florida, where he took a studio in 1947. Because of his frequent intercourse with multiple environments, he was enveloped in different cultures and scenes that can be shown through his colors, strokes, and subject matters.

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