Introducing: The Hoosier Group

The Hoosier Group was active between 1880 and 1915, becoming renowned for its depictions of rural Indiana. Its five members were American Impressionists, comprising Richard Gruelle, T. C. Steele, William Forsyth, Otto Stark and J. Ottis Adams. They had all studied art in Munich, Germany during the 1880s and returned to Indiana keen to turn their new-honed skills upon their native landscape. In 1894, a Chicago writer named Hamlin Garland coined the term ‘Hoosier Group’ after an Indianapolis exhibition of their work at the Denison Hotel. Having been central to the creation of the Society of Western Artists in 1896, they had achieved national recognition by 1904 following numerous shows in cities like Chicago and Cincinnati. Reliant on teaching to supplement their painting incomes, they set up a network of art schools within Indiana - the first of their kind within the state. Unfortunately for the Hoosier Group, artistic fashions were changing, especially after the New York Armory Show of 1913. Written off as staid and conservative, their fortunes declined. Nonetheless, they had left a lasting legacy for later generations of Indianan artists to follow.