Winold Reiss

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Winold Reiss (1886-1953) was born September 16, 1886 in Karlsruhe, Germany. He was the second son of Fritz Reiss (1857-1914) who as a well-known landscape artist. Reiss was a portraitist and his philosophy was that an artist must travel to find the most interesting subjects.

In his early years he traveled within Germany with his father who studied peasants of particular types that he wanted to draw or paint. This helped form many of Reiss' ideas about subject matter for portraiture.

Reiss came to America in 1913 and was captivated by Native Americans. It was an interest and subject matter throughout his entire career. He was a success very early, lecturing before the Art Students League and even founding a publication, Modern Art Collector.

Reiss returned once to Germany in 1921 but only as a visit; coming once again to New York City in 1922.

Reiss also illustrated Alain Locke's The New Negro, an important book about African American culture.

His most outstanding commission was for the work performed on the Cincinnati Union Terminal (now known as the Cincinnati Museum Center) in 1933. He blended Art Deco with portraiture which captured the history of Cincinnati through its people. Fourteen murals from the passenger concourse were removed to the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport in 1973, where they can be seen by airport users.

Winold Reiss was a leader who devoted most of his life towards painting a much broader cross section of ethnic diversity in America, in a compassionate and objective manner, than any artist before him.

He died on August 29, 1953 in New York City.