A portrait and still life painter, Peter Baumgras was from Germany where he studied at the Dusseldorf Academy and the Royal Academy in Munich. He emigrated to the United States in 1853 and beginning 1857, settled for about fifteen years in Washington DC to work on the decoration for the U.S. Capitol Building. A member of the sizable German community in the city, Baumgras was one of the founders of the Washington DC Art Association, taught at Columbian University, now George Washington University, and painted portraits and still lives. Although mostly active as a portrait painter, "he is now more distinguished as Washington's finest master of still life, who created lovely, often quite simple flower and fruit paintings in t...