John F. Peto

John Frederick Peto was born in Philadelphia in 1854. Although he was largely self-taught, Peto did study at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1877. Peto contributed paintings to the academy's exhibitions until 1888. During his lifetime only one major exhibition of Peto's work was presented (at the Academy); the next occurred nearly fifty years after his death. In 1889, Peto and his wife moved to Island Heights, New Jersey. He lived the remainder of his life in ill health and artistic obscurity, distancing himself from an art world that favored the work of his contemporary, William Michael Harnett. For a time Peto's trompe-l'oeil paintings were passed off as Harnett's with a forged signature. Peto died in Island Heights in 1907.

National Museum of American Art (CD-ROM) (New York and Washington D.C.: MacMillan Digital in cooperation with the National Museum of American Art, 1996)