Frederick Ferdinand Schafer Painting Catalog

4.3 Other artists named Schafer: Henry Thomas Schafer


[Return to Other artists with similar names or signatures]

Henry Thomas Schäfer (British, 1854 – 1922)

Henry Thomas Schäfer is a British Victorian-era genre painter and sculptor, elected in 1889 to the Royal Society of British Artists. He exhibited at the Royal Society, the Royal Academy, the Royal Scottish Academy, and other galleries starting in 1873. Several of his paintings have been widely reproduced and distributed in the form of posters. The subject matter of Henry Thomas Schäfer differs so dramatically from that of Frederick F. Schafer that there is little chance of confusing their paintings. (However, because of the similarity in their names and overlap in times of active work, the townscape paintings of the less well-known French artist Henri Schäfer, who also spent part of his life in Britain, are often misattributed to the British artist, and their biographical details are occasionally merged, most notably in Benezit, Emmanuel, Dictionnaire Critique et Documentaire des Peintres,…. The catalogs of auction houses regularly confuse the two. Distinct biographical sketches may be found in Wood, Christopher, Victorian Painters.)

For reference, at the right is an example of a painting by Henry Thomas Schäfer, and an example of a signature is below.

Divinely Fair by Henry Thomas Schäfer
Oil on canvas, 63 x 35 inches
Photograph: La Club Art Gallery

[painting image]

[signature inscription]
Source: Castagno, John, European Artists: Signatures and Monograms, 1800–1990

[Return to Other artists with similar names or signatures]



Title list
Other lists
Help About the Artist Copyright Notice Schafer Catalog Home Page
Comments, corrections, or questions: Saltzer@mit.edu
Mar 10, 2024, 11:47 MDT Accessibility