Mammoth Lake

oil on board, 12" x 16"

Haig S. Arklin was born in Armenia on August 22, 1881. He settled in Los Angeles in 1895. Arklin lectured at the Ebell Club on famous masterpieces and made copies of these works which were used in his lectures. He died in Los Angeles on June 5, 1965.

Sacramento Valley

oil on canvas, 20" x 36"

William Weaver Armstrong was born in Ontario, New York on April 4, 1862, the son of Mary Weaver and Bradley Armstrong. The Armstrong family moved to California in 1876 and settled in Oakland.

William’s only art training appears to have been from his father who was a talented painter. While maintaining a studio in Oakland, he made many painting trips in northern California from Santa Cruz to the Oregon border.

A loner and a quiet, taciturn man, on one of these trips he married an Indian girl named Grace, much to the consternation of his parents.

He was first listed in the Oakland City Directory in 1884 as a farmer at 509 East Fourteenth Street; by 1887 he was listed as an artist at 1351 Telegraph Avenue; in 1903 as a partner of B. F. Jenkins at 364 7th Street; in 1906 as a carriage painter.

During his short life span he became a competent and prolific painter of California scenery. Exposure to bad weather led to his death of tuberculosis in Oakland on November 26, 1906.

Exhibited: Mechanics' Institute (SF), 1885, 1888. Works held: Nevada Museum (Reno); Governor's Mansion (Carson City, NV); Oakland Museum.

Landscape

oil on canvas, 15" x 24"

Hermina was probably a daughter of the well-known painter Fortunato Arriola. She was a resident of San Francisco in 1879 and San Diego in 1908-16. Her trail is lost at that time.

Sierra Lake

oil on board, 10" x 15"

Ida Dobson Babcock was born in Darlington, Wisconsin on February 23, 1860. Ida was a pupil of George D. Brush, William Lippincott, and Charles F. Browne. nBy 1932 she had married Elmer Babcock and settled in Redlands, CA where she soon became active in the local art scene. She died there on March 15, 1942. Her painting forays into the nearby deserts produced many landscapes, often with verbenas or other desert flowers. Member: San Bernardino County Art Ass'n; Artists Council (Los Angeles). Works held: University of Nebraska Gallery (Lincoln).

Merced River, 1912

oil on canvas, 22" x 36"

Henry Howard Bagg was born in Wauconda, Illinois on June 30, 1852. He worked in Kansas before accepting a position to teach at Nebraska State Normal School in Peru. He later was a teacher at Cotner College (1902-16) and Nebraska Wesleyan University (1906-19). For many years he had a studio in Lincoln, NE while leading an itinerant existence with many trips to California and all over the West. Primarily an oil painter of western scenes, he also painted religious genre for churches in Omaha and Lincoln. He painted several hundred calendar subjects for Thomas D. Murphy Company in Iowa and the Osborn Calendar Company in New York. Examples of his Yosemite paintings are amply illustrated in the book Seven Wonders of the American West (Thomas D. Murphy, 1925). Bagg died in Lincoln, Nebraska on July 23, 1928. Works held: Joslyn Museum (Omaha).

Old School House

oil on board, 12" x 15"

Harry Lewis Bailey was born in St Louis, Missouri on December 2, 1879. He was educated at the St Louis School of Fine Arts. Due to health problems he relocated to southern California about 1907. After a few years in Ocean Park, he settled in Los Angeles. Life was difficult for artists during the Depression. With his art career on hold, he worked in a furniture store until his suicide on May 17, 1933. Member: California Art Club; California Society of Etchers; California Printmakers Society. Exhibited: Steckels (Los Angeles), 1908; California Art Club, 1914, 1927; Panama-California Expo (San Diego), 1915 (bronze medal); Barkers (Los Angeles), 1917; Printmakers of Los Angeles, 1916-29.

Midsummers Day

oil on canvas, 15" x 19"

Clifford Park Baldwin was born in Cincinnati, Ohio on February 14, 1889. By 1926 he had settled in southern California. While living in Montrose and Carlsbad, he was a pupil of Jean Mannheim, Paul Lauritz, and George Demont Otis. While on the staff of the Southwest Museum from 1933-41, he illustrated the books Gypsum Cave and Navajo Weaving. Baldwin died in Oceanside, California on July 3, 1961. Member: Painters & Sculptors of Los Angeles; Carlsbad-Oceanside Art Club. Works held: Southwest Museum (Los Angeles).

La Crescenta Mountains

oil on canvas, 20" x 24"

Oliver Glen Barrett was born in Illinois on October 19, 1903. He moved to Los Angeles in 1921 and settled in Glendale. He was author of a book entitled The Fascinating Art of Landscape Painting (1946). A prolific landscape painter, Barrett was inspired by the natural beauty of the mountains and deserts around his home in Glendale. He died there on June 2, 1970.

Trinity Alps

oil on canvas, 13" x 17"

Frederick Bauer was born in Germany in 1857. He appears to have been well trained in his native land. By the 1880s he had immigrated to California and in 1886 became a United States citizen in Visalia. Upon moving north he lived in San Francisco and Fresno until about 1928. His trail is then lost. Bauer painted in the realistic style of the Düsseldorf School. His California subjects include the Trinity Alps, coastal scenes, Chinatown and Indian genre. Exhibited: Fresno County Fair, 1891 (first prize); Presbyterian Fair (Fresno), 1896.

Old Castroville

oil on canvas, 22" x 28"

Joseph Hastings Bennett Jr. was a talented etcher, painter, and printmaker. He was born in San Diego, California on March 27, 1889. He spent most of his life in the San Francisco Bay area where he was a pupil of Armin Hansen and Arthur Hill Gilbert. The influence of his teachers is seen in his coastals, landscapes, and cowboy genre. He died in Orinda, California on on September 11, 1969. Member: California Printmakers Society; California Society of Etchers; Society of Western Artists; Walnut Creek Art Ass'n; Laguna Beach Art Ass'n; Carmel Art Ass'n. Exhibited: Oakland Art Gallery, 1933-39; Paul Elder Gallery (San Francisco), 1933; Bay Region Art Ass'n, 1935; California Printmakers Society, 1935, 1936; Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939; Society of Western Artists, 1959 (first prize). Works held: Library of Congress Print Collection.

Duck Hunters

oil on board, 22" x 28"

Joseph Hastings Bennett Jr. was a talented etcher, painter, and printmaker. He was born in San Diego, California on March 27, 1889. He spent most of his life in the San Francisco Bay area where he was a pupil of Armin Hansen and Arthur Hill Gilbert. The influence of his teachers is seen in his coastals, landscapes, and cowboy genre. He died in Orinda, California on on September 11, 1969. Member: California Printmakers Society; California Society of Etchers; Society of Western Artists; Walnut Creek Art Ass'n; Laguna Beach Art Ass'n; Carmel Art Ass'n. Exhibited: Oakland Art Gallery, 1933-39; Paul Elder Gallery (San Francisco), 1933; Bay Region Art Ass'n, 1935; California Printmakers Society, 1935, 1936; Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939; Society of Western Artists, 1959 (first prize). Works held: Library of Congress Print Collection.

Forest Scene

oil on canvas, 6" x 9"

John W. Berglund was born in Sweden in 1867. He worked in San Francisco from 1920 and into the early 1930s as a linotype operator. In his leisure he painted fine art. An Impressionist, he used small, feathery brush strokes to create coastal scenes and landscapes. With the onset of the Depression, he is believed to have returned to Sweden.

Mountain Landscape

oil on canvas, 30" x 20"

Arthur William Best was born in Mount Pleasant, Canada on July 17, 1859. He and his brother Harry attended public school in Mount Pleasant and were members of a small band. Arthur played the cornet; Harry, the violin. When the band broke up in Oregon, the brothers learned to paint before moving to San Francisco in 1895. Arthur and his wife Alice established the Best Art School at 1625 California Street and a residence at 309 Broderick. He was a staff artist for the San Francisco Examiner (1904-06). Arthur was commissioned by Southern Pacific Railroad to paint pictures of the Southwest and Mexico for travel and tourist publicity in 1905. Many of his oils and watercolors were destroyed by the earthquake and fire of 1906. His landscapes include depictions of the Arizona desert, Grand Canyon and the Sierra Nevada. He died in Oakland on January 26, 1935. Member: San Francisco Art Ass'n; Berkeley League of Fine Arts; Bohemian Club. Exhibited: Oregon State Fair, 1891 (first prize); Mark Hopkins Art Institute, 1898, 1904; San Francisco Art Ass'n, 1904-16; San Francisco Artists Society, 1905; Berkeley Art Ass'n, 1908; California State Fairs (awards); Alaska-Yukon Expo (Seattle), 1909 (bronze medal); Del Monte Art Gallery, 1910, 1912; Sorosis Club, 1913. Works held: Oakland Museum; Phoenix Museum; University of Oregon; Charles M. Russell Gallery (Great Falls, MT); Santa Fe Railroad.

Colorful Hillside

oil on canvas, 14" x 20"

Arthur William Best was born in Mount Pleasant, Canada on July 17, 1859. He and his brother Harry attended public school in Mount Pleasant and were members of a small band. Arthur played the cornet; Harry, the violin.

When the band broke up in Oregon, the brothers learned to paint before moving to San Francisco in 1895.

Arthur and his wife Alice established the Best Art School at 1625 California Street and a residence at 309 Broderick. He was a staff artist for the San Francisco Examiner (1904-06).

Arthur was commissioned by Southern Pacific Railroad to paint pictures of the Southwest and Mexico for travel and tourist publicity in 1905. Many of his oils and watercolors were destroyed by the earthquake and fire of 1906. His landscapes include depictions of the Arizona desert, Grand Canyon and the Sierra Nevada.

He died in Oakland on January 26, 1935.

Member: San Francisco Art Ass'n; Berkeley League of Fine Arts; Bohemian Club. Exhibited: Oregon State Fair, 1891 (first prize); Mark Hopkins Art Institute, 1898, 1904; San Francisco Art Ass'n, 1904-16; San Francisco Artists Society, 1905; Berkeley Art Ass'n, 1908; California State Fairs (awards); Alaska-Yukon Expo (Seattle), 1909 (bronze medal); Del Monte Art Gallery, 1910, 1912; Sorosis Club, 1913. Works held: Oakland Museum; Phoenix Museum; University of Oregon; Charles M. Russell Gallery (Great Falls, MT); Santa Fe Railroad.

Sierra Foothills

oil on board, 16" x 20"

Walafried Mathias Beyerle, a painter and lithographer, was born in Germany on October 24, 1902. He settled in San Francisco in 1929. For many years he was an employee of the Schmidt Lithograph Company. He died in San Francisco on May 1, 1971. Exhibited: Society for Sanity in Art, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, 1940 (still life).

Mountain Stream

oil on canvas, 24" x 30"

George Sanders Bickerstaff was born on June 7, 1893 in Marianna, Arkansas. He was a self-taught artist except for a brief period at the Art Institute of Chicago. He worked in Texas before moving to California in 1922. His early years were spent in San Diego, Van Nuys, and Los Angeles; whereas, he later moved north to Ukiah where he remained until his death on July 12, 1954. A prolific oil painter of mountain and desert scenes, his landscapes often include eucalypti as well as rolling hills of poppies, lupines, and other California wildflowers. Occasionally, he painted seascapes, still lifes, and western and Indian scenes. Typically his signature was simply, "Bickerstaff." He was adept at promoting his own work and sold many of them to decorate hotel lobbies, hospitals, rest homes, and mortuaries. His thousands of landscapes vary from prosaic potboilers to inspired, painterly canvases. He exhibited several times in Van Nuys and with Paul Lauritz. One of his large oils entitled Buffalo Gap once hung in the Abilene (Texas) City Hall and is now in the museum in Buffalo Gap, Texas.

Hunters Point

oil on board, 10" x 16"

August F. Bilz was born in Germany on March 6, 1871. He was a sign painter in Des Moines, Iowa in 1930. He later settled in San Francisco where he remained until his demise on September 6, 1961.

Grand Canyon

oil on board, 12" x 18"

Biography unavailable

Azusa, 1936

oil on board, 12" x 18"

Frederick Augustus Blatz was born in New York on March 3, 1897. He moved to Los Angeles with his family in 1906. He died there on June 13, 1980. An accomplished artist, his works are rare.

Rural Setting

oil on canvas, 12" x 18"

Ruth Boscarino was born in North Carolina on February 14, 1907. She appears to have moved to California about 1940. After settling in Ventura, she remained there until her demise on September 12, 1985. A competent landscape painter, her works are rare.

Lake Scene

oil on board, 12" x 18"

L. Pierre Bottemer was an itinerant artist who traveled widely in the U.S. About 1950 he established a studio-home in Laguna Beach where he painted many seascapes and coastals, often with sunsets. In the 1970s he had a studio in Pompano Beach, Florida. He is buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery in Fort Lauderdale.

Mountain Landscape

oil on board, 7" x 9"

George Frederick Breckenridge was born in Minnesota on February 25, 1882. During the 1930s he painted colorful landscapes of the southern California deserts.

He died in Santa Barbara, California on Sept. 30, 1954.

Mount Tamalpais

oil on canvas, 20" x 24"

Cecil Ramona Brehman was born in Ohio on May 13, 1914. She was painting at an early age. While a resident of Alameda during the 1920s, she painted still lifes, landscapes of the San Francisco Bay area and the coast at La Jolla. She often signed her paintings with the super imposed monogram CRB. Her married name was Webb at the time of her demise in Mendocino, California on April 3, 1989. Exhibited: Oakland Art Gallery, 1928; Santa Cruz Art League, 1928.

Late Afternoon

oil on board, 11" x 14"

Alphonso Herman Broad was born in East Eddington, Maine in 1851. He settled in Berkeley, California in 1877. The next year he was elected to the first board of trustees of the newly incorporated town and served as town marshal. In 1880 he went into business as a building contractor and designer, and became well known in Oakland and Berkeley for his Eastlake-style cottages. Some of his buildings in Berkeley include the Whittier School, LeConte School, and Columbus School. He was a highly successful businessman when he took up oil painting as an avocation. A self-taught artist, he received criticism from his neighbor William Keith with whom he made many sketching expeditions into the Sierra Nevada and surrounding country. His palette invariably held his own shade of "apple green." It was his custom to paint a landscape to be hung in a certain spot in a house he had finished. Broad died at his home at 2030 Bancroft Way on March 25, 1930. Works held: Odd Fellows Temple and Elks Club (Berkeley); Oakland Museum.

Mountain Trail, 1937

oil on canvas, 16" x 20"

Sidney Lorenzo Brock was born in Missouri on August 3, 1869. He was in Oklahoma City in 1910-20, Denver in 1930 and a few years later moved to Los Angeles. He died there on March 18, 1943. His works are rare.

Redwoods

oil on canvas, 14" x 16"

Buell Robins Brown was born in Tennessee on February 12, 1888. By the 1920s she had moved to California. She died in Los Angeles on Feb. 12, 1971. Her rare landscapes include scenes of the redwoods.

Oak Trees

oil on canvas, 16" x 20"

William Howell Bull, a painter and illustrator, was born in Buffalo, New York on January 26, 1861. He moved to Northern California in 1882.

During 1893 he spent seven weeks in the Kings River Canyon.

After 1901 he was a resident of San Mateo, California. With Gottardo Piazzoni, Xavier Martinez, C. P. Neilson, Blendon R. Campbell, and Matteo Sandona, he cofounded the California Society of Artists in 1902 as a reaction to conservative attitudes of the local art association which restricted younger artists.

After 1915 he illustrated for Sunset magazine as well as for the Southern Pacific Railroad and Stanford University.

He died at his home in San Mateo on June 15, 1940.

Although rare, his works include landscapes of the Valley of the Moon, Yosemite, and other scenic spots in northern California.

Exhibited: San Francisco Art Ass'n, 1900. Works held: Railroad Museum (Sacramento).

Mount Shasta, 1904

oil on canvas, 16" x 24"

Biography unavailable

Late Afternoon

oil on board, 10" x 14"

Leola Hall was born in San Leandro, California on June 18, 1878, the daughter of a cement contractor. She was a pupil of Raymond Yelland at the School of Design, and for 13 years studied with William Keith whose influence is evident in her works. She was a close friend of the Dollar family and many of her landscapes and views of Mount Diablo were painted on the Dollar ranch (now Rossmoor) near Walnut Creek. She was also a fine portraitist whose sitters included Senator Burton Wheeler of Montana, Fremont Older, August Vollmer, David S. Jordan of Stanford University, poet Edwin Markham, and the mother of Joaquin Miller (as well as paintings of buildings on his property which is now part of the Redwood National Forest). Leola was also a popular architect of about 50 well-designed homes along College and Ashby avenues in Berkeley as well as her own home at 2929 Piedmont Avenue. The homes she built were of the craftsman style and are often confused with those of Julia Morgan. Most were built before 1912, the year she married Herbert Coggins. After that time she concentrated on painting and politics, having been active for many years in civic affairs as a women's suffrage leader. She died at the family home in Berkeley on September 22, 1930. A picture of the artist is on page 336 of the Keith biography by Brother Cornelius. Exhibited: California State Fair, 1899-1902; San Francisco Art Ass'n, 1901-12; California Artists, Palace of Fine Arts, 1921; Oakland Art Gallery, 1928; Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939; Alameda County Building, 1939 (solo). Works held: Oakland Museum; Berkeley Architectural Heritage Ass'n; Bancroft Library (UC Berkeley).

Tiburon, 1933

oil on board, 9" x 11"

Isabel Margaret Porter was a painter, photographer, and craftsman. She was born in Petaluma, California on March 6, 1875 and graduated from San Jose Normal School about 1898. After two years at the Mark Hopkins Art Institute, she worked for Shreve & Company for a few years as a pen-and-ink artist for greeting cards, place cards, etc. From Dirk Van Erp she learned coppersmithing and produced lamps, shades, pen trays, and other hammered copper objects. In 1906 she moved across the bay to Sausalito, married Henry Collins, and built a home at 885 Bridgeway. She then taught in the public schools of the San Francisco Bay area until retirement about 1945. Exhibited: San Francisco Art Ass'n, 1896, 1901; California State Fair, 1900 (gold medal). Works held: California State Library; California Historical Society.

Mountain Landscape

oil on canvas, 24" x 28"

Ralph William Holmes was born in La Grange, Illinois on October 1, 1876. He grew up in Illinois and studied at Northwestern University and AIC. After further art study in Paris, he joined the faculty at Art Institute of Chicago (1903-12) followed by five years at the Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh. In 1918 he moved to southern California and established a home in Atascadero. He was active as a muralist and as an instructor at Otis Art Institute (1923-48). Holmes died in Atascadero, California on February 6, 1963. His landscapes of Yosemite and Bryce Canyon as well as the desert and rolling hills of southern California have brought him national fame. Member: Los Angeles Art Ass'n; Academy of Western Painters (Los Angeles); California Art Club (president, 1939-41); Painters & Sculptors of Los Angeles (president, 1936-38); Long Beach Art Ass'n; American Artists Congress; Laguna Beach Art Ass'n. Exhibited: Carnegie Institute, 1915 (silver medal); Atascadero Art Ass'n, 1918; Oakland Art Gallery, 1919; Painters & Sculptors of Los Angeles, 1926, 1932 (gold medal); California State Fair, 1930; Santa Cruz Art League, 1934; Santa Paula, 1940 (1st prize); Golden Gate International Exposition, 1940; Gump's (San Francisco), 1940; Glendale Art Ass'n, 1950.