Walter Loos was born in Switzerland in 1887. Little is known about his life in Europe, but he likely studied art there before coming to Canada to settle in Belle Plaine, Saskatchewan in 1907. Loos homesteaded there, worked at the Moose Jaw sheriff's office in 1912, and at the same time painted and taught art classes occasionally. He sold a series of his paintings to Moose Jaw's head librarian, A.H. Gibbard. These works were later returned to the Moose Jaw Library for permanent display (1957).
Loos painted many Saskatchewan landscapes, including the areas around Fife Lake, Wood Mountain, Willow Bunch, and Poplar Creek. In 1968, the Moose Jaw Times-Herald described Loos' works as “delicate and precise creations characterized by vivid prairie skies and clear fresh colors.”
In 1922, Walter Loos was hired by the Great Northern Railway to paint an inventory of the wild flowers in Glacier Park in Montana. Following this, he moved to San Francisco. He worked there as an antique dealer for thirty-two years. In 1956, he moved to Sebastopol, California, where he died in 1966.
