Born in Gloucester, Massachusetts, George Elmer Browne studied at Cowles Art School and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and later at the Académie Julian in Paris. He exhibited widely, and his work is held in major museums in the United States and France. Although a resident of Paris, he was well known for his summer classes in Provincetown, Massachusetts. Browne’s most typical subjects are European and American townscapes, coastal views, and scenes of the everyday life of fishermen and peasants.