1855-1935
Born of German parents, Charles Niehaus was employed in his youth as a stonecutter in Cincinnati and decided to pursue a career as a professional sculptor. According to his second wife and future biographer, Regina (Armstrong) Niehaus, he was an excellent draughtsman and realized quite early that he would make his career in modeling and carving. His first artistic education was accomplished at the McMicken School of Art in Cincinnati. As did many other Cincinnati artists, Niehaus pursued his studies further by going, in 1877, to Munich. There he enrolled in the Royal Academy and won a first place medal, reportedly the first American to do so. After an extended tour of Europe, he returned to Cincinnati in 1881. His first major commission was a statue of the recently assassinated President James A. Garfield, ordered by the state of Ohio for the Capitol in Washington. It was the first of several works that Niehaus created for the Capitol.
After the completion of the Garfield statue, and one of William Allen, also commissioned by the state of Ohio, Niehaus returned to Europe and settled in Rome where he lived and worked until 1885. He found inspiration in the classical works which he studied there and his own efforts in this mode won him membership in the L'Associazione della Artistica Internazionale di Roma. On returning to America, he established a studio in New York City. He lived and worked there and in New Jersey for the rest of his life.
During the 1890s, many other public commissions came to Niehaus. These included several works for the state of Connecticut; the Astor Doors for Trinity Church, New York, models for which he exhibited at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893; Moses and Gibbon for the Library of Congress; and the monument to Samuel Hahnemann for Scott Circle, Washington, the model for which was displayed in front of the Art Building at the PanÄAmerican Exposition in Buffalo in 1901. This last work, the result of a coveted and competitive commission, brought Niehaus his first fame and led to many more public commissions. During the first decades of the twentieth century, he executed several works for the state of Kentucky, including a pediment for the new state capitol building in Frankfort; a monument to Francis Scott Key for the city of Baltimore; a statue of John Paul Jones for Washington, D.C.; and several memorials to the victims of World War I for the cities of Hoboken, New Ark, and Hackensack, New Jersey.
No doubt due to his continual activity with large, public commissions, Niehaus was not an active exhibitor. He showed his work at the Academy only in 1889 and several times during the first five years of the twentieth century. He also exhibited with the Society of American Artists for a few years around 1900. Most of the works which he did exhibit were portrait busts, the best known of which is probably of the sculptor John Quincy Adams Ward (National Museum of American Art, Washington).
After the completion of the Garfield statue, and one of William Allen, also commissioned by the state of Ohio, Niehaus returned to Europe and settled in Rome where he lived and worked until 1885. He found inspiration in the classical works which he studied there and his own efforts in this mode won him membership in the L'Associazione della Artistica Internazionale di Roma. On returning to America, he established a studio in New York City. He lived and worked there and in New Jersey for the rest of his life.
During the 1890s, many other public commissions came to Niehaus. These included several works for the state of Connecticut; the Astor Doors for Trinity Church, New York, models for which he exhibited at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893; Moses and Gibbon for the Library of Congress; and the monument to Samuel Hahnemann for Scott Circle, Washington, the model for which was displayed in front of the Art Building at the PanÄAmerican Exposition in Buffalo in 1901. This last work, the result of a coveted and competitive commission, brought Niehaus his first fame and led to many more public commissions. During the first decades of the twentieth century, he executed several works for the state of Kentucky, including a pediment for the new state capitol building in Frankfort; a monument to Francis Scott Key for the city of Baltimore; a statue of John Paul Jones for Washington, D.C.; and several memorials to the victims of World War I for the cities of Hoboken, New Ark, and Hackensack, New Jersey.
No doubt due to his continual activity with large, public commissions, Niehaus was not an active exhibitor. He showed his work at the Academy only in 1889 and several times during the first five years of the twentieth century. He also exhibited with the Society of American Artists for a few years around 1900. Most of the works which he did exhibit were portrait busts, the best known of which is probably of the sculptor John Quincy Adams Ward (National Museum of American Art, Washington).
