Rhythmic line, contour and pattern are the hallmarks of Hennings’ images, whether field sketches or easel paintings. Trained at the Art Institute of Chicago, IL, and at the Royal Academy, Munich, Germany, he visited Taos, NM, in 1917 and four years later moved there, setting up a studio on Kit Carson Road. In 1924, Hennings was voted into the Taos Society of Artists. A figure painter by training and preference, he claimed that New Mexico almost turned him into a landscapist, which is apparent in his professed adoration of the sinuous trunks of aspens and cottonwood trees. He won numerous awards at home and abroad, including the 1925 Walter Lippincott Prize at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts; the 1926 and 1933 lsidor Medal and the Ranger Fund Purchase prizes at the National Academy of Design; a medal at the 1926 International Exhibition in Paris and honorable mention at the 1927 Paris Salon.