John F. Francis

Who was John F. Francis?

John F. Francis was an American painter, primarily of still lifes.

He was born in Philadelphia. Predominantly self-taught as an artist, he worked until 1845 as a portrait painter in central and eastern Pennsylvania. Francis's portraits reveal his early fascination with the most minute details. In 1845, Francis began exhibiting his works at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Philadelphia Art Union, which promoted American artists by awarding paintings to subscribers using lottery-like drawings. It was in this period that he began to concentrate on still lifes, which had been established as a popular genre in Philadelphia by Raphaelle Peale and other painters. His first known still life is dated 1850, and by 1854 he ceased to paint anything else. Francis became known as a leading practitioner of luncheon and dessert still life paintings, developing an intricate vocabulary of forms required by his specialized subject. William H. Gerdts writes: "Of all the mid-century still-life specialists, Francis was the most painterly.