Louis Prang

Louis Prang
File:Louis Prang.jpg Louis Prang
Born	(1824-03-12)March 12, 1824 Breslau, Prussia
Died	Los Angeles, California
Nationality	United States
Known for	Printing, Lithography, Publishing
Spouse(s)	Rosa Gerber

Louis Prang (March 12, 1824 – September 14, 1909) was an American printer, lithographer, publisher, and Georgist. He is sometimes known as the "father of the American Christmas card."

Youth

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Louis Prang House - Roxbury, Boston, MA

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Louis Prang Factory - Roxbury, Boston, MA

Lincoln as a boy, reading at night, by Eastman Johnson

Prang was born in Breslau in Prussian Silesia. His father Jonas Louis Prang was a textile manufacturer and of French Huguenot origin; his mother, Rosina Silverman, was German. Because of health problems as a boy, Prang was unable to receive much standard schooling and became an apprentice to his father, learning engraving and calico dyeing and printing. In the early 1840s, Prang travelled around Bohemia working in printing and textiles. However, after some travel in Europe, he became involved in revolutionary activities in 1848. Pursued by the Prussian government, he went to Switzerland and in 1850 emigrated to the United States and Boston, Massachusetts.

Early work

Prang's early activities in the US publishing architectural books and making leather goods were not very successful, and he began to make wood engravings for illustrations in books. In 1851 he worked for Frank Leslie, art director for Gleason's Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion, and later with John Andrew. In 1851, he married Rosa Gerber, a Swiss woman he had met in Paris in 1846.

Lithography and career

In 1856, Prang and a partner created a firm, Prang and Mayer, to produce lithographs. The company specialized in prints of buildings and towns in Massachusetts. In 1860, he bought the share of his partner, creating L. Prang and Company and began work in colored printing of advertising and other forms of business materials. The firm became quite successful, and became known for war maps, printed during the American Civil War and distributed by newspapers.

In 1864, Prang went to Europe to learn about cutting-edge German lithography. Returning the next year, Prang began to create high quality reproductions of major art works. Prang also began creating series of popular album cards, advertised to be collected into scrapbooks, showing natural scenes and patriotic symbols. At Christmas 1873, Prang began creating greeting cards for the popular market in England and began selling the Christmas card in America in 1874. Therefore, he is sometimes called the "father of the American Christmas card." Prang is also known for his efforts to improve art education in the US, publishing instructional books and creating a foundation to train art teachers.

In June 1886 Prang published a series of prints under the title Prang's War Pictures: Aquarelle Facsimile Prints. These became popular and helped inspire a genre of such prints, particularly the series issued by Kurz and Allison. However, Prang aimed at a more modern and individual treatment, as opposed to the panoramic style of Kurz and Allison, and before them, Currier and Ives.

In 1897 L. Prang and Company merged with another firm, creating the Taber-Prang Company and moved to Springfield, Massachusetts (filed for bankruptcy in about 1938). Prang died in Los Angeles on vacation in 1909. He is buried in Forest Hills Cemetery in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts.

Lithographs

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  Bicycling

• Civil War trompe l'oeil by Boston Public Library.jpg

  Civil War trompe l'oeil

• Dogs Not Admitted by Boston Public Library.jpg

  Dogs Not Admitted

• Donkey by Boston Public Library.jpg

  Donkey

• North Conway Meadows by Boston Public Library.jpg

  North Conway Meadows

• An Object Lesson by Boston Public Library.jpg

  An Object Lesson (Boston Public Library)

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  Christmas card by Louis Prang, showing a group of anthropomorphized frogs parading with banner and band.

• Prang's Valentine Cards2.jpg

  "Prang's Valentine cards" 1883 advertisement for L. Prang & Co., digitally restored.

• A Friend in Suspense by Boston Public Library.jpg

  A Friend in Suspense, (Boston Public Library)

• Beach Scene by Boston Public Library.jpg

  Beach Scene

• Dessert No. 4 by Boston Public Library.jpg

  Dessert No. 4

• Fisherman bringing in their catch by Boston Public Library.jpg

  Fisherman bringing in their catch

References

• Bethany Neubauer. "Prang, Louis"; American National Biography Online Feb. 2000. Taber Prang Art Co.

External links

• The Winterthur Library Overview of an archival collection on Louis Prang.
• Louis Prang & Company Collection The Boston Public Library's Louis Prang & Company Collection on Flickr.com
• Prang maps at the British Library
• The Louis Prang papers, 1848-1932, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution