Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, Harry Shokler was was a painter and a pioneer in the artistic use of silk screen printing. He studied at the Cincinnati Art Academy, the Chester Springs Academy (a summer program of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts), and at the New York School of Fine and Applied Arts (later Parsons). He spent several years working and studying in Europe and North Africa, and staged a solo exhibit of his work in Paris. Returning to the United States, Shokler was employed by the WPA, and documented the people and places of New York City in his serigraphs and paintings. He taught at the Brooklyn Museum School, Princeton University, Columbia University, and the Southern Vermont Arts Center. He is the author of Artists Manual for Silk Screen Print Making, a highly regarded work that has been reprinted several times. He ultimately settled in Londonderry, Vermont.