Frederick James specialized in genre scenes of eighteenth-century subjects, figures in interiors, and religious subjects. After attending the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia, he went to Paris, where he studied with Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824-1904). It may have been in Paris that James developed his interest in genre subjects. Upon his return to the United States, he settled in New York City, where he lived until sometime before 1907, when he died in Quebec, Canada. James was a frequent exhibitor at the National Academy of Design in New York (1874-98), the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (1876-91), and the Brooklyn Art Association (1893, 1894).