Otto Henry Bacher was born in Cleveland, Ohio, to a family of German descent.  He first studied art at the age of sixteen with local genre trompe l'oeil still-life artist, DeScott Evans.  Although he studied with Evans for less than one year, Bacher's early work, comprised mainly of still lifes, betrays Evans's influence.

After a short period in Philadelphia, where he studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Bacher returned to Cleveland and met Willis Seaver Adams, an artist from Springfield, Massachusetts, who had just recently arrived upon the Cleveland art scene.  Soon the two artists were rooming together.  Adams was instrumental in the founding of the Cleveland Art Club, as well as the establishment of...