John Frederick Peto

John Frederick Peto (1854-1907), American painter, usually identified with William Harnett as a master of trompe l'oeil (deceives-the-eye) illusionism. Peto developed his own unique painting style and is now recognized as an important American master in his own right. He was born in Philadelphia, and in 1877 he enrolled in the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Peto never studied abroad, but he did partake of the great tradition of Philadelphia still-life painting, which began at the end of the 18th century with members of the celebrated Peale family. In 1889 he moved from Philadelphia to the seaside community of Island Heights, New Jersey, where he built a combined home and studio. The commonplace contents of his studio—books, newspapers, mugs, pipes, candlesticks, musical instruments, paper sacks of candy—became his subjects.

Some of the same kinds of objects that Peto painted were also used by his friend and fellow Philadelphian William Harnett. Because Harnett had achieved a substantial reputation during his lifetime and Peto remained obscure well into the 20th century, the works of the two artists were sometimes confused. A few paintings by Peto even bear false Harnett signatures. Yet Peto, with his soft brushwork, never showed Harnett's desire for exact replication of textures. Instead, Peto focused upon inventiveness of composition and color.

Peto's originality is especially evident in those of his still-life paintings that emphasize two-dimensional space—boards with objects suspended from them and letter racks depicting various snippets of paper held beneath crisscrossed ribbons. With a keen sense of abstract design, he placed objects, sometimes tilted or hanging precariously, in complex relationships. In his work Peto showed his exceptional talent as a colorist, notable for his beautiful blues and greens, often startlingly contrasted with orange and yellow.

In Peto's series of rack pictures, the images of photographs, calling cards, envelopes, and other papers are combined to suggest biographical clues. Throughout his career and increasingly in his later years, the objects he painted show the evidence of wear and decay. Books on shelves are battered and used. Doors are shown with nails bent and hinges broken. The office boards and rack pictures contain pieces of paper torn, folded, or bent and ribbons frayed and sometimes broken. The sense of deterioration and mortality in these works was probably influenced by the artist's constant struggle with a painful kidney ailment, of which he died during a visit to New York in 1907.