Jasper Francis Cropsey (1823–1900) was an American
landscape artist, part of a movement known as the
Hudson River School. Cropsey was trained as an
architect, and worked on Manhattan
brownstones, the since-demolished
14th Street station for the
IRT Sixth Avenue Line in Manhattan, and St. Luke's Episcopal Church on
Staten Island. In addition to architecture, Cropsey also studied
watercolor painting and
figure drawing, exhibiting his work at the
National Academy of Design from 1844. In 1866, he opened a studio in New York, specializing in autumnal landscape paintings of the northeastern United States, often idealized and with vivid colors. Cropsey co-founded, with ten fellow artists, the
American Society of Painters in Water Colors in 1866. He is seen here in a circa-1870 photograph by American
lithographer and photographer
Napoleon Sarony.
Photograph credit: Napoleon Sarony; restored by Adam Cuerden