Otto Stark

Otto Stark was an American Impressionist painter, muralist, commercial artist, printmaker, and illustrator from Indianapolis, Indiana, who is best known as one of the five Hoosier Group artists. Stark's work clearly showed the influence of Impressionism, and he often featured children in his work. To provide a sufficient income for his family, Stark worked full time as supervisor of art at Emmerich Manual High School in Indianapolis from 1899 to his retirement in 1919, and as part-time art instructor on the faculty of the John Herron Art Institute from 1905 to 1919. Stark frequently exhibited his paintings at international, national, regional, and local exhibitions, including the Paris Salon of 1886 and 1887; the Five Hoosier Painters exhibition (1894) in Chicago, Illinois; the Trans-Mississippi Exposition (1898) in Omaha, Nebraska; the Louisiana Purchase Exposition (1904) in Saint Louis, Missouri; and international expositions (1910) in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and Santiago, Chile. He also supervised the Indiana exhibition at the Panama-Pacific International Exhibition (1915) in San Francisco, California. Stark remained an active artist and member of the Indianapolis arts community until his death in 1926.