Edmund Darch Lewis

Training under Paul Weber is recorded. The recorded working language is English. The field of work recorded is landscape painting. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are landscape. Residence is recorded at Philadelphia. Work by Edmund Darch Lewis is recorded in the collections of Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Lancaster Museum of Art, New York Historical, Reading Public Museum and Brandywine Museum of Art.

Lewis's early work in oil, because of his excellent training, was precocious and is considered technically superior to his later work. He traveled throughout Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York, painting river scenes, and for 2 decades he traveled to the White Mountains and painted landscapes of mountains, rivers, and lakes. He made extensive marine paintings throughout New England, becoming a prolific and successful artist. His work was appreciated because of the luminosity of their objects. Because of the lively yet glowing work, he is considered one of the Luminist painters in the Hudson River School. After mastering oil painting early in his career, Lewis switched to watercolor painting. Although not as technically outstanding, his watercolors were also admired for their luminosity, and Lewis continued to generate canvases in mass production style.

Later in life, as an affluent artist Lewis collected decorative art, including furniture, ceramics, tapestries, and paintings by the masters. He had 2 adjacent homes constructed on 22nd St. in downtown Philadelphia to show his collection to Philadelphia society.

Lewis's painting of Lake Willoughby (Vermont), a huge 80-inch canvas finished in 1867, is owned by the Pennsylvania Academy. The painting emphasized both the picturesque and sublime aspects of nature like other popular, mid-century popular spectacular panoramas of the Hudson River School.