A Street in Saint Louis

This scene depicts a bustling affluent neighborhood. Fine carriages, African Americans transporting wares, and well-dressed passersby proceed along the thoroughfare and wide sidewalks. The sense of a community where all members agree to get along, central to genre painting, is conveyed here in the friendly exchanges between residents.

The fine Italianate home, with its gently sloping roof and stately iron fence, has never been identified. It is likely that Henry Lewis created it from a group of sketches he made of houses while working in St. Louis as a scenery painter for the St. Louis Theatre in 1848. Lewis completed the painting in Dusseldorf, Germany, a haven for American genre artists who produced many of their most popular works there. Once finished, the works of art were shipped back to the United States for exhibition and sale.