Richard Edward Miller was born in St. Louis in 1875 and showed an early proclivity for art and drawing. He studied at the St. Louis School of Fine Arts and, in 1898, earned a scholarship to study in Paris at the Académie Julian under Benjamin-Constant and Jean-Paul Laurens. He later became a teacher at the Académie Colarossi.

Miller’s early work was tonalistic and included many nocturnal scenes of Paris. However, his association with Frederick Carl Frieseke lightened his palette, and the influence of American Impressionism became increasingly evident in his paintings of this period.

While living in Paris, Miller became well known in American art circles alongside painters including Guy Rose, Lawton Parker, and Frieseke. Together, these artists painted at Giverny and socialized with Claude Monet. His favorite color combinations, juxtapositions of greens and purples, reflect Monet’s influence.

Miller won gold medals at the Paris Salons of 1901 and 1904. In 1905, he received a medal at the Liège World’s Fair, and the following year he was appointed a Knight of the French Legion of Honor. In 1907, his reputation was further enhanced when his painting Vieille Hollandaise was purchased by the French government for the Musée du Luxembourg.

Miller returned to the United States in 1915 and taught at several schools, including the Stickney School in Pasadena, California, where he was a member of the California Art Club, an organization dedicated to plein-air painting. He later painted and taught in Provincetown, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. Miller died in 1943 in St. Augustine, Florida.