William Keith Original Tonal Oil Painting of California Misty Woodland Landscape

William Keith was a Scottish-American painter famous for his plein air California landscapes, characterized by how the landscapes captured feelings and emotions, rather than actual details. He was neither pure Realist nor pure Impressionist. During the 1870s, Keith painted a number of six-by ten-foot panoramas, including “Kings River Canyon” (Oakland Museum, originally owned by Governor Leland Stanford) and “California Alps” (Mission Inn, Riverside). These competed with paintings of similar size and subject matter by famous California landscape painters Albert Bierstadt and Thomas Hill. Keith is associated with Tonalism and the American Barbizon school of painting. Keith was a great friend of the famous naturalist and explorer, John Muir, who was also born in Scotland and in the same year as Keith. Keith explored the American West, accompanying Muir on several occasions. From the late 1880s on, Keith painted primarily in a subjective vein in which his emotional and spiritual reactions to the landscape were more important than topographical facts. He painted many woodland views that resembled those of Théodore Rousseau and other Barbizon painters, as well as the American painter, George Inness. In 1891, Inness visited the San Francisco Bay Area, and he and Keith painted together, with Keith regaining an enthusiasm for painting that he had begun to lose.

Although most of William Keith’s painting career was spent in California, he initially immigrated to New York, in 1850, as an engraver. He moved to California in 1859 after visiting California on a trip he made for Harper’s Bazaar. in 1858. Keith began exhibiting his paintings in San Francisco in 1864 and lived in the San Francisco Bay Area and Berkeley until his death in 1911. He was a prolific painter, having painted over 4,000 paintings in his lifetime. Tragically, thousands of his paintings were lost in the fires following the San Francisco earthquake in 1906, making his paintings all the more collectible.

Signed, “W. Keith” in the lower left corner.

Elegantly framed in a richly patterned gilt frame with an acanthus leaf inner border.

Measures: 29.5 wide x 25.5 high x 2.5 deep (framed). Canvas is estimated to measure 24″ wide x 20″ deep.

Weighs 12 pounds.

Pictured with an overhead light. Light not included.