Lot description
ARTIST: Otto August Kuhler (New Mexico, Colorado, 1894 - 1976) NAME: The Black Bridge MEDIUM: oil on canvas CONDITION: Excellent. No visible inpaint under UV light. SIGHT SIZE: 16 x 20 inches / 40 x 50 cm FRAME SIZE: 22 x 26 inches / 55 x 65 cm SIGNED: Lower right CATEGORY: antique vintage painting SKU#: 114633 WARRANTY: 7 days returns accepted if item doesn't match description US Shipping $75 + insurance. Otto August Kuhler (New Mexico, Colorado, 1894 - 1976) Otto August Kuhler (1894 – 1977) was an American designer, one of the best known industrial designers of the American railroads. According to Trains magazine he streamstyled more locomotives and railroad cars than Cret, Dreyfuss and Loewy combined. His extensive concepts for the modernization of the American railroads have repercussions onto the railways worldwide until today. In addition he was a prolific artist of industrial aesthetics and of the American West in general. Kuhler (pronounced "Cooler") became a US citizen in 1928. Eight years before he had married Simonne Gillot, daughter of a Belgian doctor. They had one daughter, Winona (married name: Zabriskie), and one son, Renaldo, who became known as a natural-history museum artist. The Kuhlers sold their home with studio on a hill near Blauvelt, New York, and bought a 460-acre ranch (the KZ Ranch) straddling Deer Creek near Bailey, Colorado. Cattle raising and painting the West were now on Kuhler's agenda, the fruits of which can be seen in many American museums. Kuhler found beauty in industrial scenes, ranging from mines and factories to railroads, and he painted them with intricate attention to detail and accuracy. The Kuhler's farmhouse burned down and was rebuilt by them. At age 75 he sold the farm and moved with Simonne to Santa Fe, New Mexico, in 1969 to continue painting. Eight years later they moved back to Denver, Colorado, where Kuhler died at age 83. Currently, some of his work can be seen at the Colorado Railroad Museum in Golden, CO. Other Kuhler paintings are owned by the New Mexico Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum, University of Missouri at St. Louis, Henry Ford Museum, Westmoreland Museum of American Art, Denver Public Library in Denver, Colorado, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, and the Roentgen Museum in Remscheid, Germany. The Denver Public Library collection includes 12 Kuhler oils donated by his wife that depict mining and railroad scenes in Colorado.