Samuel Bentz (1792–1850) was an American

fraktur Fraktur () is a calligraphic hand of the Latin alphabet and any of several blackletter typefaces derived from this hand. The blackletter lines are broken up; that is, their forms contain many angles when compared to the curves of the Antiqu ...

artist. A native of Cocalico, Lancaster County,

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

, Bentz was the son of Reverend Peter Bentz and Anna Maria Caffroth Bentz; his father, an itinerant farmer,

joiner A joiner is an artisan and tradesperson who builds things by joining pieces of wood, particularly lighter and more ornamental work than that done by a carpenter, including furniture and the "fittings" of a house, ship, etc. Joiners may work in ...

, and unordained

Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

preacher, committed suicide in 1818, and his mother was forced to raise him on her own. He became a schoolmaster in the vicinity of

Ephrata Ephrata may refer to: Places * Ephrata, Suriname * Ephrata, Pennsylvania, U.S. *Ephrata, Washington, U.S. * Ephrata Township, Pennsylvania, U.S. Other uses *Ephrata Cloister, a religious community in Ephrata, Pennsylvania See also * * Efrata or E ...

. Shortly before his death, Peter had established a school on the family land, and Samuel taught there for much of his life, living in the school building. Much of his fraktur was birth records, which he produced to augment his income. Some pieces refer to Mount Pleasant, and Bentz was designated the "Mount Pleasant Artist" until a bookplate with his signature was discovered. At his death, he left behind a box with eighteen frakturs. Much of Bentz's work is distinguished by its bold lines and the use of architectural elements as decoration, almost

Greek Revival The Greek Revival was an architectural movement which began in the middle of the 18th century but which particularly flourished in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, predominantly in northern Europe and the United States and Canada, but ...

in style. Sometimes a human face is included; more often, a clock face, with its implications of ''

memento mori ''Memento mori'' (Latin for 'remember that you ave todie'tetragrammaton The Tetragrammaton (; ), or Tetragram, is the four-letter Hebrew language, Hebrew theonym (transliterated as YHWH), the name of God in the Hebrew Bible. The four letters, written and read from right to left (in Hebrew), are ''yodh'', ''he (l ...

'' into his paintings, an unusual inclusion for a fraktur artist, especially given his background as a member of the

Reformed Church Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Cal ...

. Also unusually, he rarely included Bible verses in his work. Six works by Bentz are in the collection of the

Winterthur Museum Winterthur Museum, Garden and Library is an American estate and museum in Winterthur, Delaware. Pronounced “winter-tour," Winterthur houses one of the richest collections of Americana (culture), Americana in the United States. The museum and es ...

, including a cutout piece. His work has also been forged.

References

1792 births 1850 deaths American male painters 19th-century American painters People from Lancaster, Pennsylvania Painters from Pennsylvania 19th-century American male artists {{US-painter-stub