Charles Ludwig Strickerartist • painterAmsterdam 1877-1937 Haarlem

Charles Ludwig Stricker, self-taught, painted some 200 paintings, exclusively in oil on canvas. He found his subjects in the Dutch landscape around his hometown Amsterdam, later Haarlem. But sometimes he travelled further away, towards Rotterdam, the islands of Zuid-Holland and the surroundings of Ede. En plein air he painted landscapes, often adjacent to small towns, seascapes, dunes, fishing boats and farmers at work. He painted on weekends and outside the office hours of his work at a masonry materials trade. He did not follow an education, so he could often be found in museums to observe and he followed developments in contemporary painting. Stricker didn't sell. He gave a lot away to family or kept his works himself. The last years of his life he lived with his sister in Amsterdam, who recorded the location and year of many of Charles' works. After his death in 1937, all works remained in her attic and the canvases remained in family possession until the 80s. Then they were rediscovered, further divided among family members and part of it was sold.