Frank Duveneck, October 9, 1848 – January 3, 1919, was an American painter, printmaker, sculptor, and teacher. Born in Covington, Kentucky, to German immigrant parents, he apprenticed with a church-decoration firm before studying at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Munich under Wilhelm von Diez and working in the circle of Wilhelm Leibl.
Duveneck established schools in Munich and Polling and taught groups of American students in Germany and Italy who became known as the “Duveneck Boys.” His students included John Henry Twachtman, Otto Henry Bacher, John White Alexander, and Elizabeth Boott, whom he married in 1886. He worked chiefly as a portrait and figure painter and also produced etchings and sculpture.
After Elizabeth Duveneck’s death in 1888, he returned to the United States and taught at the Art Academy of Cincinnati, becoming chairman of its faculty in 1905. His work is held by the Cincinnati Art Museum, Metropolitan Museum of Art, National Gallery of Art, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and other public collections.
Self-Portrait, c 1877
Oil on canvas, 29.3 × 23.7 in
Cincinnati Art Museum
Henry James, Sr., 1872–1877
Oil on canvas, 30.3 × 21.8 in
Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields
Portrait of Winslow Homer, c 1872
Oil on canvas laid down on Masonite, 20 × 16 in
Private Collection
Professor Ludwig Loefftz, c 1873
Oil on canvas, 37.9 × 28.7 in
Cincinnati Art Museum
The Turkish Page, 1876
Oil on canvas, 42 × 58.3 in
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia
The Cobbler’s Apprentice, 1877
Oil on canvas, 39.5 × 27.9 in
Taft Museum of Art, Cincinnati
Dillard H. Clark, 1877
Oil on canvas, 30.3 × 25.4 in
American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center, Washington DC
Beechwoods at Polling, Bavaria, c 1878
Oil on canvas, 45.5 × 37 in
Cincinnati Art Museum
Still Life with Watermelon, c 1878
Oil on canvas, 25.1 × 38.1 in
Cincinnati Art Museum
Elizabeth Boott Duveneck, 1888
Oil on canvas, 65.1 × 34.8 in
Cincinnati Art Museum
Marie Danforth Page, c 1889
Oil on canvas, 38 × 25.3 in
Cincinnati Art Museum
Reclining Nude, 1892
Oil on canvas, 27.3 × 54.3 in
Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields
Portrait of Maggie Wilson, 1898
Oil on board, 15 × 12 in
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston