News & Events

June 2007

June 16, 2007.  Annual Dinner, The Pacific Club, 4110 MacArthur Boulevard, Newport Beach.  Reception at 6 p.m., dinner at 7 p.m.  Presentation by Phil and Marian Kovinick.  Menu choices are grilled shrimp and prosciutto-wrapped scallops or fillet of beef.  Cost is $90.

May 6, 2-5 p.m.  Alice Powell and Roger Armstrong invite HCC members to celebrate with them the recent publication of Armstrong’s 8-volume set of paintings, “A Life in Paintings.”  The reception will be at Roger’s studio, 23011 Moulton Parkway, #H-5, Laguna Hills, Ca. 92653.  Tel is 949-837-2551.  For more information see RogerArmstrong.com.

American Eagle Fine Art announces new acquisitions including works by Carl Sammons, John Hilton, Marie Boening Kendall, Dora Block Alexander, Edda Maxwell Heath and John Haley.  For more details see www.AmericanEagleFineArt.com.

On April 15, the American Art Council of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art was privileged to view the collection of California paintings owned by Dwight Stuart of Los Angeles.  Stuart’s home has been featured in Architectural Digest.

Pam Ludwig, who formerly ran Joan Irvine Smith Fine Arts, has retired to North Carolina.  Her new address is 204 Pine Berry Circle, Hendersonville, NC 28739.  Phone is 828-692-7162.  Cell is 714-270-0284.  Her email is still GalleryGrace@yahoo.com.  Congratulations to Pam.  North Carolina is reportedly very beautiful.

A Maynard Dixon Museum is located inside Mark Sublette Medicine Man Gallery in Tucson, Arizona.  Many rare Dixon works are on view along with his easel, letters he wrote from Mt. Carmel, Utah, poetry, and family photographs.  Also on display are photographs by his second wife Dorothea Lange.  See www.maynarddixon.org.

May is California Museum Month.  A state senate resolution by Senator Alan Lowenthal of Long Beach declares that “California is home to over 1300 museums that are located in every county and region and that serve over 26 million visitors annually.  This coincides with Governor Schwarzenegger’s declaration of March as ‘Arts Education’ month.  The governor recently proposed $100 million reinvestment in arts education for California public schools.”  (from Art Ltd, May 2007)  Art Ltd for March 2007 contains an article “Museums on the Rise” that discusses the major expansion projects of selected museums including the Museum of Contemporary Art in San Diego, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento, The Museum of Latin American Art in Long Beach, the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, and the Museum of Ventura County.

William A. Karges Fine Art has issued another “Recent Acquisitions” brochure.  On the cover is pictured Armin Hansen’s “The Montereans/Cosimo”.  Twenty-four pages, it reproduces twenty-three paintings in color.

Claremont Museum of Art, the state’s newest art museum, opens in Claremont, California on April 15 with an exhibit of local artist Karl Benjamin.  “It all started in 1987 with a comment by Marion (Hoppy) Stewart.  The well-known weaver and wife of sculptor Albert Stewart had just returned from a walk with a friend to Claremont’s Padua Hills Theater.  Her friend said a museum should be created inside the theater to exhibit the work of Claremont’s many artists.  Stewart conveyed this idea to her other friend, Marguerite McIntosh who – along with her husband, renowned ceramicist Harrison McIntosh – has been part of the city’s arts community for more than 50 years.  The remark was enough to prompt Marguerite to seek the support of two former mayors in establishing a museum.  While the theater underwent restoration, another significant historic building came into the picture: the College Heights Lemon Packing House, which had just been saved from demolition and earmarked for renovation into a mixed-use building.  Its historic significance and ideal downtown location made it a perfect site for the Claremont Museum of Art.  When the Museum’s board of trustees realized they could base a museum in downtown, the pace of planning accelerated.  The Museum Incorporated in 2004, and in February 2006, the board formally announced that the museum would open in the Packing house…. In addition to spotlighting the work of Claremont artists in a permanent collection, the board decided to devote the institution’s main gallery to showcasing art from around the nation and world.  That decision set the Museum on a trajectory to become a regional museum of international significance.”  (from the website)  www.claremontmuseum.org.

Ralph Love (1907-1992), California landscapist, has a website www.ralphlove.com.  It appears to have been created by Lee Youngman Galleries, Calistoga, Ca. which markets the artist’s estate.   See also www.leeyoungmangalleries.com.

The California Arts Council of the Bowers Museum held its annual dinner on Sunday March 2, 2007.  The Museum owns a large number of paintings by Frank Coburn.  Coburn was the theme of the evening with paintings hung on the walls and a lecture by Dan Jacobs, former owner of Orr Gallery in San Diego.  The Council is currently raising funds to restore the Museum’s Coburn paintings and is open to hearing about museums that might like to take a traveling show.  The Bowers Museum owns most of the artistically significant paintings by this artist.

Rumor has it the San Diego Historical Society has started a council for collectors of historic California art.

The Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento has just been lent 19 paintings by Edwin Deakin (1838-1923), given, many years ago, to the California Department of Finance.  These paintings were among Deakin’s favorite works and because of that, most were never framed or appropriately prepared for sale during Deakin’s lifetime.  In order to make the works presentable for current display, the Crocker Art Museum wants to properly conserve and frame them.  This will cost $3,000 to $7500 for each work, meaning the Crocker needs approximately $100,000 to care of all the works.  Scott Shields, curator, is currently researching the works and plans to author a biography and mount a significant exhibit.  All contributions are 100% tax-deductible.  Donors of $100 or more will receive an invitation to a donors-only preview in January 2008.  Donors adopting the entire cost of an individual painting can be recognized on that painting’s label.  Gifts of securities are welcome.  Your gift may qualify for a matching grant.  Please respond by May 30, 2007.  For questions, call 916-264-5423.

The Chinese Historical Society of America recently acquired the personal collection of Daniel K. E. Ching consisting of thousands of two-and three-dimensional representations of Chinese Americans in 19th and early 20th century American popular culture.  Post-cards, chalkware, advertising trade cards, sheet music, and toys are among the items.  The collection is currently being catalogue by the Asian American Studies Department of San Francisco State University.

On May 31, 2007, the Pasadena Museum of California Art held a fundraiser in conjunction with the opening of its new show “Maynard Dixon Masterpieces from Brigham Young University” and its 5^th year anniversary   There was a 5 p.m. reception with cocktails with honorary chairperson actress Diane Keaton and a 6 p.m. event that included a lecture on Dixon by curator Don Hagerty, the premiere airing of a documentary film on Dixon produced by Jayne McKay, and a buffet dinner.  The Museum’s rooftop terrace was jammed with filled tables; the exhibit is outstanding and accompanied by several books on Dixon, and the film was excellent.  Director Wesley Jessup announced he has accepted a position in Idaho, so the museum is undertaking a search for a new director.

Over the past ten years, the Museum of Art and History, Santa Cruz, has held several exhibits relating to historic California art.  From Nov. 17, 2001 to April 7, 2002, it showed Timed Exposure: Photographing Santa Cruz, 1939-1969.  From October 26 – November 24, 2002, it showed Simply Scene: The California Paintings of Herman Struck (1887-1954).  Struck is not well known, although an excellent painter.  He spent most of his adult life in Marin County depicting rural landscapes populated by farmers and ranchers.  Stuck’s subject matter came from his experiences as a ranch hand in Hollister and a foreman on Moraga Ranch in the East Bay.  After he settled in Marin County, he depicted fisherman.  Most of the paintings had never before been seen.  His paintings are simple, graceful, uncluttered, quiet in mood, and have clear masses of color.  Curated by Kathleen Moodie.  For more information see www.santacruzmah.org the section on past exhibits.

HCC member Peter Richman informs us that 40 pencil drawings by Stanton MacDonald Wright, preliminaries for the Santa Monica Public Library murals of the 1930s, are being offered by Almagre Books in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  The scrapbook in which these are contained was owned by Archie Musick, who was a pupil and friend of the artist.  Price is $12,500.  Hopefully some benefactor will come forward and present these to a local museum collection.  Along the same line, Edenhurst Gallery in Palm Desert, is selling the mid-size studies for Dean Cornwell’s mural in the Los Angeles Public Library.  They are finished paintings.  Excellent.  And, again, should go to a local museum.

California art historian Marjorie Dakin Arkelian passed away peacefully December 14, 2006.  She was 91.  Born on November 15, 1915, she was raised in Burlingame, Ca.  Her mother taught at San Mateo Jr. College and her father was a mining engineer.  Marjorie graduated from Burlingame High School and received a bachelors of arts from the University of Arizona.  Marjorie’s Uncle, painter Edwin Dakin (changed to Deakin), was a celebrated nineteenth-century Bay Area painter known for his still lifes.  Her career included authorship of a bi-weekly column in the Berkeley Gazette known as “Marge Notes,” and she subsequently became editor of the San Francisco Magazine.  She was hired as the art historian for the New (1960) Oakland Museum, for which she authored several important catalogues, including one on the Kahn Collection.  After retiring, Marjorie worked as an art appraiser and served on the DeYoung Museum advisory board.  She and her husband Levon traveled widely in the U. S. and Canada and particularly loved Monterey and Carmel.  She is survived by her son Martin of Willits, Ca.  (generally from the San Francisco Chronicle, December 26, 2006)

Permanent displays of historic (pre-1945) California paintings can be found at the following institutions.  (The websites for some of these institutions can be found at www.californiaart.com at the end of the ‘Galleries’ section.)  Arranged North to South.

(See earlier Newsletters for exhibits that might still be on view.)

Now in the galleries.  Looking at Long Beach, Long Beach Museum of Art.  Continues the Museum’s tradition of presenting a variety of views of and attitudes about the city of Long Beach as well as works by Long Beach-based artists.  Twenty-five works by ten artists.  Claremont Connections celebrates the 100-year anniversary of the city of Claremont and the opening of the new Claremont Museum of Art.  Included are works by Claremont College faculty and alumni.

Ongoing.  Corita: A Celebration of Life, Corita Art Center at the Immaculate Heart Community, L. A.  web site is www.corita.org. 

Through June 2007.  Colorado & the West, David Cook Galleries, Denver, Colorado.  150 works including some by California artists: Charles Partridge Adams, Gustave Baumann, George Elbert Burr, John F. Carlson, and Gene Kloss.   (Online exhibition at www.davidcookfineart.com. 

Through June 10, 2007.  Beatrice Wood: Art and Alchemy, Museum of Ventura County, Ventura, Ca.  Luster glaze ceramics and sculptural pieces.

Through June 30, 2007.  Inspiring Women: Works by Dorr Bothwell, Claire Falkenstein, Ynez Johnston, Helen Lundeberg, and Joyce Tremain, Tobey C. Moss Gallery, L. A.

Through June 30, 2007.  Rondal Partridge Puzzles and Pieces, Michael Dawson Gallery, L. A.  See also www.michaeldawsongallery.com.  Photographer.

Through October 28, 2007 (opened February 27).  Rancho Monterey, Spanish Revival and Mexican Decorative Arts in California, California Heritage Museum, Santa Monica.  Showcases Monterey and rancho-style furniture, California ceramics and tile, Mexican ceramics, and fine art by such artists as Phil Paradise, W. H. D. Koerner and Hernando Villa.  “In the second quarter of the Twentieth century, California rediscovered its Spanish and Mexican heritage.  In addition to the Spanish haciendas containing dark furnishing accented with iron – designs championed by Hollywood stars such as Bela Lugosi, Will Rogers and Norma Talmadge, developers now began building low-slung ranch houses inspired by the original adobe ranches of Monterey, California’s first capital.  Furniture makers and decorative artists responded with a range of colorful designs, a romantic view of “California ranchos” that captured the imagination of New Californians seeking opportunity in the Golden State.  At the same time, as motor touring became the norm, Californians visited Mexico in increasing numbers bringing back souvenirs that fit easily into the new rancho-style homes.  Whimsical cartoons by Mexican artists such as Juan Intenoche decorated furniture, Mexican hand embroidery was featured on blouses and skirts, and tiles depicted beautiful senoritas, sleeping gauchos, and stubborn burros. The new decorative arts were brighter and more light-hearted as Californians sought to ride out the great Depression on a wave of color and optimism.” (from the website)

Through September 23, 2007.  Treasures of the West: Art from Desert Collections, Palm Springs Art Museum. 100 artworks collected by residents of the Coachella Valley plus some items from the Palm Springs Art Museum.  Changing perceptions of the West in American art over the past 150 years.  www.psmuseum.org.   Included is Native American and American art in various media from traditional forms such as basketry, kachinas and textiles to historic and contemporary sculptures, paintings and works on paper.  Traditional images of the American West show an untamed wilderness and promise a “new beginning”.  All reveal America’s cultural values, customs and perceptions.  Included are works by historic California artists William Keith and Maynard Dixon as well as several active in the second half of the twentieth century.

February 5 – April 30, 2007.  Reaching Out: Selections from the Permanent Collections of The Museum of Art & History, Santa Cruz County Bank, Santa Cruz, Ca.  Over 70 artworks by over 50 California artists, both historic and contemporary, were displayed at Santa Cruz County Bank’s three locations in Santa Cruz, Scott’s Valley and Watsonville.

February 16 – Spring, 2007.  Henry Chapman Ford, Painter of Early California: A Selection from the Permanent Collection, Santa Barbara Historical Museum.  In celebration of the Museum’s 75^th anniversary, this exhibition and others following, will highlight treasures from the Museum’s permanent collection.  Ford was the first significant artist to call Santa Barbara home.  Settling in 1873, he enjoyed the patronage of Col. W. W. Hollister.  His favorite subject was landscapes, and he documented the Santa Barbara area while it still retained much of its natural beauty.

March 10 – April 28, 2007.  California Art 1860-1960: 31st Annual Exhibition, Kerwin Galleries, Burlingame.  See also www.kerwingalleries.com.

March 17 – April 28, 2007.  Ruth Asawa: Natural Forms, Tobey C. Moss Gallery, L. A.  Mid-century San Francisco sculptor.

March 23 – August 26, 2007.  The California College of the Arts at 100, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.  Two special design exhibitions serve as a tribute to the Bay Area art school.  The first, Innovation by Design, encompasses approximately 40 of the most innovative design objects from the Museum’s collection and beyond.  Recent and contemporary works – including lighting, posters, furniture, housewares, and architectural models – demonstrate CCA’s commitment to fostering cutting-edge design through a distinctive combination of concept and craft.  The second exhibit, Fertile Ground, features some 130 objects designed specifically for CCA by its alumni, faculty and students.  See also the website www.sfmoma.org.

March 31 – June 3, 2007.  Edgar Ewing, 1913-2006, Sullivan Goss, Santa Barbara.  Ewing was active in the mid twentieth century.  His works blended abstraction with realism.  An 8-page brochure that reproduces five works accompanies the show.

April 14 – July 28, 2007.  The California Modernist Landscape, Spencer Jon Helfen Fine Arts, Beverly Hills.  Overview of rural and urban landscape by California modernist artists of the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s.  Artists include Northern Californians: Ruth Armer, Victor Arnautoff, Raymond Bertrand, Margaret Bruton, Rinaldo Cuneo, William Hesthal, Nils Gren, Erle Loran, Helen Clark Oldfield, Otis Oldfield, Louis Siegriest and Frede Vidar.  Southern California artists include Edward Biberman, Florence Parker Bloser, Grace Clements, Merrell Gage, Peter Krasnow, Paul Landacre, Warren Newcombe, Lillian Whiting and Stanton Macdonald Wright.  The 3-fold brochure reproduces paintings by Merrell Gage, Helen Clark Oldfield and Victor Arnautoff.  See also www.HelfenFineArts.com.

April 15 – June 25, 2007.  A Conversation with Color: Karl Benjamin: Paintings 1953-1995, Claremont Museum of Art.   Hard edge abstractionist first active in the 1950s.  46 paintings spanning 42 years.  “Beginning with his earliest experiments with cubist-inspired pictorialism and stimulated by the works of Piet Mondrian, Joan Miro, and Lionel Feininger, the exhibit follows Benjamin’s trajectory through his breakthrough hard edge works and international exposure with the landmark exhibition Four Abstract Classicists in 1959 to the serial explorations with patterns, systems, letter shapes, stripes, and natural forms in the 70’s and 80’s.”  (from the website)

April 15 – June 25, 2007.  Building a Legacy: Founding a Museum, Building a Collection, Claremont Museum of Art, Claremont, Ca.  An on-going exhibit comprised of works by notable Claremont artists displayed on a rotating basis.  The inaugural exhibit includes work by Jean Ames, Aldo Casanova, Rupert Deese, Betty Davenport Ford, James Grant, Susan Lautmann Hertel, Norm Hines, James Hueter, William Manker, Harrison McIntosh, Roland Reiss, Albert Stewart, James Strombotne, and Milford Zornes.  www.claremontmuseum.org.

April 21 – June 23, 2007.  California Gold: The Majesty of the Golden State: Watercolors, Woodcuts & Etchings, Annex Galleries, Santa Rosa.  For details see www.annexgalleries.com.  Illustrated color checklist available.

April 21 – September 2, 2007.  Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk: A Century by the Sea, Museum of Art and History, Santa Cruz.  Celebrates the 100^th anniversary of the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk.  Using the recently published Santa Cruz Seaside Company’s book on the history of the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk as inspiration, this exhibition includes art, artifacts and memorabilia.  (from the website)

May 3 – June 8, 2007.  Marguerite Zorach: A Life in Art, Gerald Peters Gallery, New York.  Modernist Zorach grew up in Fresno, California but most of her professional career was spent in New York.  For details see www.gpgallery.com.

May 4-6, 2007.  Los Angeles Modernism Show, Santa Monica Civic Auditorium.  One of the top shows of its kind in the nation, showcasing avant garde art produced through the twentieth century.  This year’s theme is ‘Music and Design’.  Examples that demonstrate how modern design influenced music of the twentieth century, will be shown.  Over 90 leading international dealers will exhibit their prime finds in modern furniture, art and decorative objects.  Celebrity Johnny Depp is the 2007 honorary host for the opening night charity gala on May 4.

May 4 – June 30, 2007.  Rondal Partridge: Puzzles and Pieces, Michael Dawson Gallery, Los Angeles.  Son of photographer Imogen Cunningham, Partridge has been working with photographs since 1922.  He personally knew photographic luminaries Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams.  This exhibition displays Partridge’s contemporary works, large format assemblages or grid arrangements of tool, plant and animal studies.

May 4 – June 24, 2007.  Eyes of Hope: Portraits of San Francisco’s First Greek Colony by Photographer Leondais Pantotis, Bolinas Museum, Bolinas, Ca.  See bolinasmuseum.org.

May 5-26, 2007.  Extreme Clay, American Ceramics Society-Design Chapter, American Museum of Ceramic Art, Pomona.  Featured is California post-WWII potter Otto Heino who, with his wife Vivika, produced pots and glazes through the second half of the twentieth century.  Heino spent ten years re-creating a long-lost yellow Chinese glaze.  See also www.acs-dc.org.

May 12 – June 24, 2007.  Pastoral California: The Art of Thaddeus & Ludmilla Welch, Bolinas Museum, Bolinas, Ca.  Curated by Alfred C. Harrison, Jr.  See bolinasmuseum.org.

May 19 – August 26, 2007.  Yosemite: Art of an American Icon, Oakland Museum of California.  More than 150 native baskets, paintings, and photographs from the mid-19th century to the present.  Traveled from the Autry National Center, L. A.  Shows Yosemite’s 300-year transition from remote haven to national tourist destination.

May 19 - September 8, 2007.  Passionate Visions: Botke, DeRome, Rider and Wendt, The Irvine Museum.  Four artists with differing yet equally passionate artistic points of view.  Botke paints exotic birds in an Art Deco manner.  DeRome focused his eye on the California landscape, creating small works that now document the changed environment.  Rider, a Chicago artist, is known for his color and inspiration from Spanish great Joaquin Sorolla.  Wendt captured California’s landscape as it appeared, revering its color, geology and plant life for its intrinsic beauty.

May 26 – July 3, 2007.  Small Gems, George Stern Fine Arts, Los Angeles.  Features works by a variety of known artists.

June 2 – July 15, 2007.  Selections from the Permanent Collection, CCAA Museum of Art, J. Filippi Winery, Rancho Cucamonga, Ca.  Includes some historic California artists.  www.ccaamuseum.org.

June 2 – August 12, 2007.  Maynard Dixon: Masterpieces from Brigham Young University & Private Collections, Pasadena Museum of California Art.  “In celebration of its Fifth Anniversary, the PMCA presents the largest exhibition ever mounted of Maynard Dixon (1875-1946)…  Dixon, a native of San Francisco, depicted the open spaces of California and the Western United States through a distinctive Modernist style… His starkly beautiful paintings defined the Western landscape in the imaginations of Americans.  Also an accomplished figure painter, Dixon demonstrated a keen grasp of the humanity of his subjects, which included Depression-era urban dwellers and American Indians.  This show contains 53 pieces from Brigham Young University Museum of Art, on view for the first time ever in Los Angeles, as well as 36 remarkable pieces loaned from private collections.  The BYU Museum collection originated in 1937, when Herald R. Clark, Dean of the College of Commerce at BYU traveled to San Francisco to meet Dixon and to investigate purchasing work for the University’s collection.  By the end of his trip, Clark had chosen 85 paintings and drawings spanning all phases of the artist’s career, including not only … majestic landscapes and sensitive portraits of Native Americans, but also a substantial portion of his haunting and powerful scenes of the Great Depression.  (from a press release)  Curated by Dixon scholar Donald J. Hagerty.

June 2 – October 7, 2007.  The Edge: Where California Culture, Critters, and Environment Collide, Oakland Museum.  Explores the ever-changing boundaries created by competition between Californians and the natural environment through the juxtaposition and analysis of artwork, natural specimens, historical artifacts, and media.

June 9 – August 5, 2007.  Colin Campbell Cooper and Nell Brooker Mayhew: Selections from the Back Room, Sullivan Goss – An American Gallery, Santa Barbara. 

June 16 – July 7, 2007.  Henry Fukuhara: Expressive Visions of Manzanar, Torrance Art Museum, Torrance, Ca.  California/Japanese artist depicts WWII internment camp.  www.torranceartmuseum.com

June 18 – July 20, 2007.  Hans Burkhardt: From the University Collection, CSU Northridge University Art Galleries, Northridge, Ca.  Approximately 30 paintings and pastels by the L. A. modernist active from the 1940s to the 1990s.

June 24 – September 30, 2007.  The Festival of Arts: The First Decade, Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Beach.  Organized in conjunction with the 75^th Anniversary of the Festival of Arts and Pageant of the Masters.  Guest curated by the Festival of Arts.

July 12 – September 9, 2007.  Ansel Adams and Edwin Land: Art, Science and Invention, Photographs from the Polaroid Collection, Palmer Museum of Art, University Park, Pa.

July 25 – October 28, 2007.  Yosemite’s Structure and Textures: Photographs by Eadweard Muybridge, Carleton Watkins, Ansel Adams and Others, Cantor Arts Center, Stanford University, Palo Alto, Ca.

The following antiquarian book dealers have substantial holdings of out-of-print books on California art: Arcana on the Santa Monica Mall (310-458-1499), Ken Starosciak in San Francisco (415-346-0650), and Muz Art and Books, Sacramento (no telephone; searchable on www.abebooks.com).  If you know a title, it can be searched on www.abebooks.com or www.bibliofind.com to get comparative prices from dealers across the nation.  Searching a book on www.oclc.org -- registration is free -- will bring up local libraries that have the book.

Among dealers in new books on California art are the antiquarian dealers cited above, the bookstores of museums that specialize in California art (see list above under ‘Exhibitions’) as well as John Moran Auctioneer in Pasadena, Kerwin Galleries in Burlingame, George Stern Fine Arts in LA, Sullivan-Goss in Santa Barbara, and DeRu’s Fine Arts in Bellflower and Laguna Beach. 

Alfred C. Harrison, Jr., Pastoral California: The Art of Thaddeus and Ludmilla Welch, Bolinas Museum?, 2007.  $40.  Book signing at North Point Gallery, San Francisco, 5 – 8 p.m.

Carlos Bowden, Jr., Italians of the Bay Area: The Photographs of Gino Sbrana, Arcadia Publishing, South Carolina, 2006.  “Italian immigrant Gino Sbrana started his American life in San Francisco as a vegetable peddler.  By 1911, he had launched a large photographic studio, Pisa Foto, at Columbus and Broadway.  Later Gino founded a studio in Oakland and, in 1919, settled in San Jose.  Not content to confine his artistry to the formally posed studio portrait, he traveled over the Bay Area countryside with his large wooden field camera, using soft light on the shady side of barns or under large oaks to capture his fellow countrymen.  Gino posed them in the coastal mist with machetes poised to harvest cauliflower, perched atop their brand new motorcycles, assembled by trucks loaded with produce from the fields, sleeves rolled up and holding their vino.” (from the web) 

Suzanne Tarbell Cooper, John W. Thomas and J. Christoper Launi, Long Beach Art Deco, Arcadia, South Carolina, 2006.  “At 5:55 p.m. on March 10, 1933, Southern California was rocked by a massive earthquake.  Wood frame bungalows lost their chimneys, and engineered concrete buildings suffered minimal damage.  But unreinforced masonry buildings near the epicenter failed catastrophically, and Long Beach was particularly hard hit.  Nearly three-quarters of the school buildings, as well as many other structures, were rendered unusable until repaired or rebuilt.  The Art Deco style, in addition to being fashionably modern in 1933, met the criteria of earthquake safety, and many new structures showed its influence.  Both the Zigzag Moderne style of the 1920s, which boasted many structures that survived the earthquake, and the Streamline Moderne style that came into vogue in the 1930s, relied on sleek lines with decoration incorporated into the design.” (from the web)  Primarily photographs.

City of Palm Desert, Palm Desert Art & Architecture, City of Palm Desert, 20??  Highlights selections from the permanent public art collection and El Paseo Invitational exhibitions and historically important mid-century modern and contemporary architecture.

Gallery Selections, Los Angeles, George Stern Fine Arts, 2005.  32 page catalogue with color reproductions.

Once Upon a Time: Walt Disney – The Sources of Inspiration for the Disney Studios, Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, 2006.  358 pp.  309 illus.

Mitchell Schwarzer, San Francisco: Architecture of the San Francisco Bay Area – A History & Guide, San Francisco: William Stout Publishers, 2007.  192 pp.  223 illus.

Judith Larner Lowry, Gardening with a Wild Heart: Restoring California’s Native Landscapes at Home, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007 (second edition).  280 pp.  21 col. Illus.

Linda Gordon and Gary Y. Okihiro, eds., Impounded: Dorothea Lange and the Censored Images of Japanese-American Internment, New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2006.  216 pp.  131 illus.

Steve Grody, Graffiti L. A.: Street Styles and Art, New York: Abrams, 2006.  304 pp.  410 illus.  $35.00.

David Campany, Paper Dreams: The Lost Art of Hollywood Still Photography, Paris: Edition 7L, 2007.  110 pp.  48 illus.

Michael Webb, Venice, Ca.: Art + Architecture in a Maverick Community, New York: Abrams, 2007.  192 pp.  206 illus.

Some books found on OCLC (Online Computer Library Center) website: www.oclc.org.

Ann B. Angelo, Rudolph Schaeffer: A Memoir, thesis, 1980.

Catherine Montgomery Gleason, Los Angeles in the Modern Era, 1920-1980, U of C, Riverside?, 2005.

Merle Shipper, Jose Drudis Biada: Works from the Collection of Mount Saint Mary’s College, Los Angles: Mount Saint Mary’s College, Fine Arts Gallery, May 22 – June 26, 1983.

Art Museum of Santa Cruz County, The Dramatic Decade: California Art & Literature of the 1930s, July 6 – Sept. 22, 1996.

Painting, Drawings and Sculpture from the Collection of the University of Southern California, Los Angeles: Sotheby Parke Bernet, May 3, 1982.

Some mural bibliography from the LA Public Library California file:

“Lucile Lloyd muralist,” Southwest Builder & Contractor, 5/13/21, p. 14, col. 1.
“The Art of Mural Painting in California,” Touring Topics, March 1930, rotogravure section (artwork of Conrad Buff, Hugo Ballin, Alson Clark).
“Murals in Southern California…Within a Twenty-five mile radius of the Los Angeles City Hall,” California Arts & Architecture, July 1933, p. 2, illus.
Maynard Dixon murals in Anoakia in Arcadia, Lawrence Clark Powell, From the Heartland, pp. 125-26, and Kevin Starr, “Painterly Poet, Poetic Painter,” California Historical Quarterly, Winter 1977/78, p. 295.
Murals at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Hollywood, in John Halpern, Los Angeles, Improbable City, p. 67.
Murals in Hollywood in Bruce T. Torrance, Hollywood: The First 100 Years, p. 175.
“Mural Decorations of Laughlin Theatre,” Long Beach Daily Telegram, 11/4/1915, p. ?
Daniel P. Hoye, “The Murals of Hugo Ballin,” Los Angeles Conservancy, Jan/Feb, 1989, p. 8, illus.
Murals in Ambassador Hotel, L. A., Architectural Digest, v. 9, 2:82 1933, illus.
Murals in Bullocks, L. A., California Arts & Architecture, June 1934, p. 4.
Murals at Chouinard Art School, “Guns Turned to Patio Wall,” L. A. Times, 7/3/1932, pt. III, p. 5, illus.
Murals at Leimert Theatre, L. A. Times, 5/29/32, pt. III, p. 8, and California Arts & Architecture, June 1932, p. 6.
Mural by William Lee Woollett, “Mural Art is Attractive,” L. A. Times, 1/14/1923, pt. II, p. 31.
Mural in Million Dollar Theatre, “A Dream Come True,” Architect & Engineer, May 1918, pp. 80-86, illus.

Peter Frank, “Painter with an Edge” Frederick Hammersley, art ltd: West Coast Art + Design, May 2007, pp. 48-50.  Hammersley was one of LA’s hard edge abstractionists of the 1950s.  This article reviewed his recent retrospective at the Pomona College Museum of Art, Claremont, January 23 – April 8, 2007.

Shana Nys Dambrot, “Modernism at Home: Four Voices of its Legacy,” art ltd, West Coast Art + Design, May 2007, pp. 58-64.  Four mid-century Southern California artists are discussed including sculptor Malcolm Leland, photographer Julius Shulman, and painters Hans Burkhardt and Karl Benjamin. 

 “Early Desert Painters,” American Art Review, v. XIX, no. 2, April 2007, pp. 152-3.  Review of the exhibit of desert pictures presented by Edenhurst Galleries at the College of the Desert, Palm Desert.

Art ltd. West Coast Art + Design frequently runs articles on mid-century California artists.  The March 2007 issue includes articles on San Francisco sculptor Ruth Asawa and Claremont furniture maker Sam Maloof.

Donald J. Hagerty, “Maynard Dixon, 1875-1946,” American Art Review, v. XIX, no. 3, May-June 2007, pp. 134-141.

Maynard Dixon: Art and Spirit, by Jayne McKay, was previewed at the Pasadena Museum of California Art on May 31, 2007.  McKay started her career in commercial television production over twenty years ago and has worked on several feature films.  This was her debut as a documentary director.  Donald J. Hagerty, preeminent Dixon scholar, acted as co-writer and consultant.  Executive producer was Edenhurst Gallery.  Narration was by actress Diane Keaton, a Dixon collector.  The version shown was a “director’s cut” meaning McKay intends to make further changes.  It was 60 minutes long and followed Dixon’s career from his birth and a sickly childhood that kept him indoors where he amused himself by sketching, through his work as an illustrator, a mural painter, an easel painter, and a writer and poet.  An interesting technique segued photographs of actual landscapes into Dixon paintings demonstrating to the viewer exactly how the artist brought color and structure to his subject.  Don’t know what McKay intends to add in an additional 30 minutes, but this viewer enjoyed the film just as it was.  DVD’s available.

March 27, 2007, 7 p.m.  Brush with Life: The Art of Being Edward Biberman, produced by Jeff Kaufman, was aired at LACMA’s Brown Auditorium, sponsored by the Modern and Contemporary Art Council.  Reviewed in an earlier Newsletter, this video is entertaining, educational, and brings out the human side of the artist.  Highly recommended.  The screening was followed by a brief Q & A with Kaufman and LACMA Curator of Contemporary Art, Howard Fox.

March 20, 2007 , 12-1 p.m.  Louis Stern will speak on Alfredo Ramos Martinez and Hollywood, at the Malott Commons, Scripps College, Claremont.  While living in Los Angeles, where Ramos-Martinez moved in 1929, he painted easel paintings, which he exhibited, and murals, many commissioned by Hollywood celebrities such as screenwriter Jo Swerling, designer Edith Head, and director Alfred Hitchcock.

May 5, 2007.  June Wayne, printmaker and co-founder of the Tamarind Lithography Workshop, and Ernest de Soto, artist and printer, will discuss Ruth Asawa and the Tamarind Lithography Workshop, at the Japanese American National Museum, Los Angeles.  In 1965 Ruth Asawa’s friend and teacher, Josef Albers, recommended her for a fellowship at the Tamarind Lithography Workshop.  Wayne and de Soto share their fond memories of Asawa and her interactions with Tamarind lithographers.  Tobey Moss, of the Tobey Moss Gallery in West Hollywood, joins in the conversation and will display some of Asawa’s most remarkable works on paper.

May 6, 2007, 3 p.m.  Steefenie Wicks and Zeese Papanikolas, panel discussion “The Pantotis Archive and the Greek-American Experience,” Bolinas Museum, Bolinas, Ca.

May 12, 2007, 2 p.m.  Alfred C. Harrison, Jr., gallery talk on Thaddeus & Ludmilla Welch, Bolinas Museum, Bolinas, Ca.

May 23, 2007, 10:15 a.m.  Dan Jacobs, Art Consultant/Fine Art Appraiser, will speak on The Life and Art of Frank Coburn, at the Bowers Docent Meeting, Bowers Museum.  Open to the Public.

June 2, 2007, 1 p.m.  Maynard Dixon lecture, Pasadena Museum of California Art.  Guest curator Donald Hagerty provides an in-depth look at the art and life of Dixon.  Free with admission and for PMCA members.

June 2, 2007, 3:30 p.m.  Barret Oliver will lecture and sign his new book, A History of the Woodburytype, Dawson’s Book Shop, L. A.  (Los Angeles Salon 72)  This process of photo-mechanical printing was one of the earliest, introduced in 1864.  Aesthetically beautiful, permanent and infinitely reproducible, the Woodburytype was the first process used extensively to photographically illustrate printed matter.  More than a century after its heyday, it remains the most aesthetic of the various reproduction technologies.  No doubt many California artists had their artwork reproduced in this manner.  Oliver’s book traces Woodbury from his early experiments to the development of the technology, to its commercial success and to its domination of the illustration field.

June 21-24, 2007.  The Arts & Crafts Movement: Regionalism and Modernity- San Diego and Environs, Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla/The San Diego Historical Society/ Mingei Museum, and other venues.  The conference explores San Diegan architecture, gardens, furniture, metalwork, tile- and pottery-making, as well as painting from the late 19th through the early 20th century.  Because California’s landscape prompted reverie, it was particularly fertile ground for those drawn to the mystical thinking linked to Tonalism and plein air or Impressionist painting, including Southern California painters Mabel Alvarez, who painted murals for the Panama-California Exposition, Frank Tenney Johnson, and Maurice Braun.  Early on, California attracted many new residents to artistic communities whose formation was driven by a Utopian search for harmonious structures for life and work, whether exemplified by Lomaland, the Theosophical Society’s international headquarters at Point Loma, the more informal community organized around the Arroyo Seco in Pasadena, or the gathering of craftspeople in Mission Canyon in Santa Barbara.  Many events at and trips to historic houses, museums and galleries compliment the formal sessions.   For more complete information view the website www.artinitiatives.com.  To register, contact Initiatives in Art and Culture, 333 East 57th St., 13B, New York, New York 10022 or telephone 646-485-1952.  Conference fee is $495.  Full time students have a discounted rate of $200.

July 14, 2007, 3 p.m.  The Arc of Conveyance, a lecture, at the Pasadena Museum of California Art.  Automobile Club of Southern California archivist Morgan Yates will discuss Dixon’s 1930 cover art series in the context of the Auto Club’s role as a promoter of Southern California culture and tourism.  Free with admission and for PMCA members.

August 5, 2007, 2 p.m.  Family Day at the Pasadena Museum of California Art.  Arts and Crafts workshop inspired by the Maynard Dixon exhibition.   For children ages 5 to 10.  $10/family.  Free for PMCA members.  RSVP to 626-568-3665 x 17.

For the websites of the many ‘bricks and mortar’ auction galleries dealing with American paintings, see Publications in California Art, No. 9, newsletter for November 1999.  For the most up-to-date auction prices, see  www.artprice.com at $1.00 per entry or at www.artnet.com or www.askart.com if you are a member.  Auction Galleries that hold special sales of historic California art include Butterfields, which can be viewed at www.bonhams.com; or www.butterfields.com/calam; Christies at www.christies.com, and John Moran at www.johnmoran.com.

April 22, 2007.  Paintings from the bequest of Beth and Mellon “Bud” Baird, Monterey Museum of Art. In 2003, the Bairds gave a large collection of paintings by California artists to the Monterey Museum of Art.   Selected paintings not accessioned into the permanent collection were previously put up at auction, and this upcoming sale is the final opportunity to acquire works and support the museum at the same time.  The auction consists of 75 original works ranging in subject from landscapes to still lifes, portraits and figure studies.  Among the artists included are Charles Rollo Peters, Mary DeNeale Morgan, Anna Hills, Frank H. Myers, Theodore Wores and M. Evelyn McCormick.  For details, see the museum’s website.

June 3, 2007, 11:00 a.m.  Fine Paintings, Prints, Sculpture, Photography & Objects, Clark’s Fine Art & Auctioneers, Inc., Sherman Oaks, Ca.  Fully illustrated “catalogue” on line at www.estateauctionservice.com and www.ebayliveauctions.com.

June 16, 2007.  Auction, Albermann Galleries & Auctioneers, Santa Fe, New Mexico.  Included are paintings by the following California artists: Chen Chi, A. D. M. Cooper, Edward S. Curtis, Nicolai Fechin, Thomas Hill, Sydney Laurence, Sheldon Parsons, Edgar Payne, Carl Schmidt, Donald Teague, Gunnar Widforss, and Olaf Wieghorst.

June 19, 2007.  California & American Paintings, John Moran Antique & Fine Art Auctioneers, Inc., Pasadena Convention Center.   See also www.johnmoran.com for sale highlights.

August 7, 2007.  California and American Paintings and Sculpture, Bonhams & Butterfields, L. A. and S.F.  See also www.bonhams.com/us.

CaliforniaArt.com © copyright 2007 Dustin Publications.