Adolf Dietrich (November 9, 1877 – June 4, 1957) was a Swiss laborer who rose to become one of the most celebrated naïve artists and a leading painter of 20th-century Switzerland.

Born in the canton of Thurgau as the youngest of seven children in a poor farming family, Dietrich showed remarkable artistic ability from an early age. His schoolteacher encouraged him to train as a lithographer, but his parents refused—the family needed him to work on the farm.

Dietrich remained in his parents’ home all his life, never marrying. To supplement the modest income from the small farm, he worked as a home laborer, in a local textile mill, and in the nearby woods. Only Sundays were his own, and he devoted them entirely to drawing and painting. His earliest sketchbook dates from 1896, and his first paintings appeared around 1900. Although he had no formal art training, he took to heart the advice of visiting landscape painters who urged him to rely on his keen powers of observation.

Dietrich’s art drew exclusively from his immediate surroundings in Berlingen—tranquil rural scenes, animals, people, and simple still lifes that reflected both his world and his quiet, steadfast way of life.