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THOMAS HILL

1829 - 1908

CountrySan Francisco, California, USA

BiographyHill was born in England, but came to Taunton, Massachusetts when only twelve. He started a career as a decorative painer in Boston in 1844. He studied art with Rothermel at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in 1853 and with P. Meyerheim in Paris in 1866. However, Hill was primarily self-taught. He exhibited successfully in Boston and Philedelphia in the 1850s. In 1861, he moved to California where he painted the grandiose landscapes for which he is most noted. Later in his life he went to Paris and studied for a year, but returned to settle in California where he died in 1908.
"The Fisherman" by Hill was donated to BYU by Wesley Burnside.

Information found in the "Miscellaneous H" artist binder in The Print Study Room

Hill exhibited at the following: Art Union, San Francisco, 1865 (prize); Centennial Expo, Philadelphia, 1876 (medal); Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 1884 (medal). During his career, he received 31 awards. His work has been preserved at the Denver Art Museum, the California Capitol, the Los Angeles Museum of Art, the Worcester Museum of Art, the University of Kansas Museum of Art, the Oakland Museum of Art, and the Currier Gallery of Art. He helped V. Williams found the San Francisco School of Design in 1874. He was commissioned by Muir to paint in Alaska in 1887. He produced nineteen illustrations for Muir's "Picturesque California" in 1888.

Hill is best known for his majestic landscapes of California, especially Yosemite. His brother, Edward Hill, painted throughout his life in the White Mountains, but remained in the shadow of his famous brother, Thomas.

Thomas Hill was a member of the Boston Art Club and the San Francisco Art Association. Hill's last known address was San Francisco.

http://whitemountainart.com/Biographies/bio_th.htm
Entered by: Michael Clayton, Print Study Room Staff, 2/6/06

Hill, Thomas (1829-1908), like his brother, Edward Hill (q.v.), was originally from Birmingham, England. He became a very famous landscape painter of California scenery following his on-again, off-again, on-again settlement there in 1861. Known for his romanitc realist oils featuring Yosemite, Hill also painted in such wide-ranging locales as New England, Alaska, Washington, Oregon, various parts of California, and even Utah, maybe. Chosen by Leland Stanford to paint "Driving in the Last Spike" in celebration of "the joining of the rails" on May 10, 1869, at Promontory Point in northern Utah's Box Elder County, hill was to have been paid $50,000. The contract was broken, however, because a colleague claimed to have been less prominently displayed than Stanford. The controversial painting, which now hangs in the California State Capitol, was not sold until after Hill's death in Raymond, California, and then for much less than its original price. (b. September 11, d. June 30)

Olpin, Robert S., William C. Seifrit, and Vern G. Swanson. ARTISTS OF UTAH. Salt Lake City: Gibbs Smith Publisher, 1999: 129.

Person TypeIndividual