John Gast (painter)

John Gast (21 December 1842 in Berlin, Prussia – 26 July 1896 in Brooklyn) was a Prussian-born American painter and lithographer.

He was the son of Heinrich Konrad "Leopold" Gast (1810-1898) and Bertha Pauline Henriette Volkmann (1819-1902).

John's brother Paulus became a prominent business and political leader in St.

He earned a degree from the Royal Academy there and returned to St. Louis to work at his father's company.

[9] The painting glorified westward expansion and is considered the American equivalent to Eugène Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People (1830).

Some of Gast's other paintings include: Bluffs on the Mississippi Below the Arsenal (1865), Angel Sitting on Mountain Top (1871), untitled (mother adjusting a blanket...) (1870s), American Prostonewares (1872), and Homeward (a ship sailing under dark skies, painted March 24, 1896, a few months before his death and perhaps his last work).