Henry Alexander
Henry Alexander was born in San Francisco to a pioneer family. At the age of 17, he traveled to Germany to study at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Munich. He later returned to his hometown, calling it “the painter’s happy hunting ground.” In 1887 he left for New York City in order to be at the center of the American art world. Since many of his paintings and records were destroyed in the San Francisco earthquake in 1906, only a selection of his paintings can still be viewed today.
When is cultural accuracy important?
William Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan’s popular comic operetta The Mikado(1885) contributed to a taste for Japanese culture in Europe and the United States. Alexander’s image of a San Francisco production includes examples of cultural mistakes (such as the presence of an open rain parasol and platform shoes indoors), showing that the enthusiasm for Japanese culture was not always matched by a high degree of cultural accuracy.
Anonymous gift
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