Ralph Albert Blakelock (1847-1919) was an American romanticist painter. Blakelock is famous for his dream-like landscapes. He was largely self-taught, and spent much of his early career in the American West, traveling with Native American groups.
In 1899, Blakelock was diagnosed with what is now known as paranoid schizophrenia, and spent much of the remainder of his life in the Middletown (New York) State Hospital for the Insane. During this time, his popularity as an artist grew, while neither him nor his family received any of the profits. For the last two decades of his life, Blakelock was one of the most well-known American artists, all while he suffered in mental institutions, or while under the care of abusive guardians. Today, his work can be found in the Phillips Collection, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Columbus Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Art, Boston, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and more.
