Louis Choris (1795–1828) was a German-Russian painter and explorer.Louis Choris
. The Bancroft Library - University of California

Biography

Louis Choris was born in

Yekaterinoslav Dnipro is Ukraine's fourth-largest city, with about one million inhabitants. It is located in the eastern part of Ukraine, southeast of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on the Dnieper River, Dnipro River, from which it takes its name. Dnipro is t ...

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

(now

Dnipro Dnipro is Ukraine's fourth-largest city, with about one million inhabitants. It is located in the eastern part of Ukraine, southeast of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on the Dnieper River, Dnipro River, from which it takes its name. Dnipro is t ...

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

) to German-Russian parents on March 22, 1795. In 1816, he visited the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is bounded by the cont ...

and the west coast of

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

on board the Russian expeditionary ship ''

Rurik Rurik (also spelled Rorik, Riurik or Ryurik; ; ; died 879) was a Varangians, Varangian chieftain of the Rus' people, Rus' who, according to tradition, was invited to reign in Veliky Novgorod, Novgorod in the year 862. The ''Primary Chronicle' ...

'', serving as an artist with the Romanzoff expedition under the command of Lieutenant

Otto von Kotzebue Otto von Kotzebue (; 30 December 1787 – 15 February 1846) was a Baltic German naval officer in the Imperial Russian Navy. He commanded two naval expeditions into the Pacific for the purposes of exploration and scientific investigation. The fi ...

, which was tasked with exploring a northwest passage. In terms of his work as an artist, Choris is said to have "painted nature as he found it. The essence of his art is truth; a fresh, vigorous view of life, and an originality in portrayal." His illustrations on the Romanzoff expedition are therefore likely to faithfully represent the subjects he painted. After the voyage of the ''Rurik'', Choris went to Paris where he issued a portfolio of his drawings in lithographic reproduction and studied in the ateliers of Gerard and Regnault. Choris worked extensively in pastels and documented the

Ohlone people The Ohlone ( ), formerly known as Costanoans (from Spanish meaning 'coast dweller'), are a Native American people of the Northern California coast. When Spanish explorers and missionaries arrived in the late 18th century, the Ohlone inhabited ...

in the missions of

San Francisco, California San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

in 1816. Choris left

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

in 1827 for

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and was killed by robbers on March 22, 1828, en route to Vera Cruz, Mexico. Choris' works are now held in public collections by such museums as the Anchorage Museum of History and Art, the

Honolulu Museum of Art The Honolulu Museum of Art (formerly the Honolulu Academy of Arts) is an art museum in Honolulu, Hawaii, Hawaii. The museum is the largest of its kind in the state, and was founded in 1922 by Anna Rice Cooke. It has one of the largest single co ...

and the

Oakland Museum of California Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, California, Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major We ...

Legacy

Otto von Kotzebue named the Choris Peninsula after Choris.

Gallery

File:Louis Choris (1795-1828) - Kamehameha, King of the Sandwich Islands by Louis Choris, (Russian), pen and watercolor.jpg, '' Kamehameha, King of the Sandwich Islands'', pen and watercolor by Choris, 1816,

File:Louis Choris 'Kaahumanu, Woman of the Sandwich Islands'.jpg, '' Kaahumanu, Woman of the Sandwich Islands'', pen, ink wash and watercolor, 1816,

File:Louis Choris - 'Interior of a House of a Chief of the Sandwich Islands'.jpg, ''Interior of a House of a Chief of the Sandwich Islands'', pen, watercolor and gouache, 1816, Honolulu Academy of Arts File:Danse des hommes dans les iles Sandwich (National Library of New Zealand).jpg, ''Men's dance in the Sandwich Islands'', 1816, published 1822,

National Library of New Zealand The National Library of New Zealand () is charged with the obligation to "enrich the cultural and economic life of New Zealand and its interchanges with other nations" (National Library of New Zealand (Te Puna Mātauranga) Act 2003). Under the ...

File:Ohlone Indians in a Tule Boat in the San Francisco Bay 1822.jpg, '' Ohlone Indians in a Tule Boat in the San Francisco Bay'', 1816, published 1822 File:Choris, Tschuktschen.jpg, ''A Chukchi family in front of their home near the

Bering Strait The Bering Strait ( , ; ) is a strait between the Pacific and Arctic oceans, separating the Chukchi Peninsula of the Russian Far East from the Seward Peninsula of Alaska. The present Russia–United States maritime boundary is at 168° 58' ...

'', summer 1816. File:Port d'Hanarourou by Louis Choris.jpg, Port of

Honolulu Honolulu ( ; ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, located in the Pacific Ocean. It is the county seat of the Consolidated city-county, consolidated City and County of Honol ...

as seen by Choris in 1816

References

Literature

* Daum, Andreas W., ''German Naturalists in the Pacific around 1800: Entanglement, Autonomy, and a Transnational Culture of Expertise.'' In ''Explorations and Entanglements: Germans in Pacific Worlds from the Early Modern Period to World War I'', ed. Hartmut Berghoff et al. New York, Berghahn Books, 2019, 70‒102. * Ellis, George R., ''Honolulu Academy of Arts, Selected Works'', Honolulu, Honolulu Academy of Arts, 1990, 181. * Forbes, David W., ''Encounters with Paradise: Views of Hawaii and its People, 1778–1941'', Honolulu Academy of Arts, 1992, 23–62.

External links

Louis Choris - American Journeys

{{DEFAULTSORT:Choris, Louis 1795 births 1828 deaths Artists from Dnipro 19th-century Ukrainian illustrators 19th-century Ukrainian painters Ukrainian explorers Artists from the San Francisco Bay Area History of the San Francisco Bay Area Ukrainian people of German descent Ukrainian murder victims People murdered in Mexico Painters from the Russian Empire Expatriates in the Spanish Empire Illustrators from the Russian Empire 19th-century explorers from the Russian Empire