The Fisherman’s Home by George Frederick Castleden

Born in Canterbury, England, George F. Castleden studied art under Sir Thomas Sidney Cooper and at the South Kensington School of Art. He moved to Canada in 1889 to continue his studies at the Canada Regina Institute. He returned to England for several years, then moved to New Orleans in 1911. Inspired by the French Quarter, he became an early activist in the preservation of the historic district. Castleden was a member of the New Orleans Art League and the British Empire Society of Art. In 1936 he moved to Charleston, South Carolina, where he remained for the rest of his life.

The painting Bayou Landscape is one of a seven-piece series of rural Louisiana views commissioned by Frank Evans, then the proprietor of D. H. Holmes Department Store in New Orleans.

These rich and colorful paintings decorated the restaurant of the Canal Street store and were shaped to fit their locations above doorways and on the walls. When Dillard’s Department Store, a national chain, purchased D. H. Holmes, it donated photographs, paintings, and memorabilia relating to Holmes to the Louisiana State Museum.