Fleischer Museum Exhibitions
Feminine Impressions: Women of the California School
The following has been extracted from the brochure used during the exhibition.
Donna Norine Schuster
In The Garden, 30" x 30"
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The first exhibition of French Impressionism was held in 1874 in
Paris, France. This style of painting originated as a reaction to the
French art establishment of the time. These artists visually experienced
urban and rural environments and communicated their interpretations on
canvas. Capturing the beautiful vibrant light effect on a subject matter,
they used short brush strokes of juxtaposed colors.
Mary Cassatt, the first American woman artist to paint in the impressionistic style, studied and exhibited with the French Impressionists. Joining them in 1877, she sought a career that her family and society opposed. As women, pursuing artistic careers was taboo. This lone female was instrumental in achieving American approval of the French Impressionist style in the United States. Reflecting the techniques of her mentors, Edgar Degas and Edouard Manet, she established herself as one of the leading Impressionist artists and became an inspiration for other women struggling to achieve a career in art. As travel to California was made easier with the completion of the Transcontinental and Santa Fe railways in 1869 and 1885, young artists headed west. News of the diverse landscapes and bright sunny days along with the desire to paint out of doors piqued their interest to settle in San Francisco, the recognized art center of the West at the time. Other artists chose the Los Angeles and Laguna Beach areas. While there was no defined separation of these two art colonies they arbitrarily became known as the Northern and Southern artists of the California School of American Impressionism, 1890-1930’s. In 1871, the first organized group of artists and benefactors united and established the San Francisco Art Association. Just three years later the California School of Design opened, and nearly fifty of the sixty students were women. The California School of Design remained the focal point of art education for women living in the west for many years to follow. For those women who could afford the luxury of European studies, the Beaux-Arts and the Académie Julian in Paris provided an important educational resource. The San Francisco Art Association held its first major women's art exhibition in 1885. The all female Sketch Club, founded two years later, created a forum for camaraderie among women artists and generated public awareness. Chicago's 1893 World's Columbian Exposition and the 1894 California Midwinter International Exposition were important exhibitions in which the women of the California school participated. Alice Chittenden and Maren Freolich were the first females to exhibit at the all male Bohemian Club in 1898. The great earthquake and fire of 1906 destroyed the home of the Sketch Club along with most of the studios and works of the San Francisco artists. This disaster forced many of the artists to move and to assimilate to other parts of California. In 1907, the Women Painters of California Club opened in Southern California and held its first exhibition in 1909. Later in 1915, the Palace of Fine Arts hosted the landmark Panama-Pacific International Exposition with over 7,500 exhibits, including many female artists. The most important historic event for these women occurred in 1920 with the ratification of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution providing women's suffrage. Women of the California School enriched the great American art heritage with their achievements and their contributions. These early frontier women served as art critics for newspapers, staff in museums and owned galleries. They were jury members at public exhibitions, art instructors and greatly influenced society's attitude toward art. Feminine Visions: Women of the California School 1890-1930s takes a look at nine of these professional enigmas who lived in the ruggedness of the West. These women painted, exhibited and competed with the same enthusiasm as their male counterparts and sought to be compared and judged by the same standards of the opposite gender. They sought to achieve and rise above the social taboos of working artists and strived to be recognized as a vital asset to the visual art history of America.
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Jessie Arms Botke |
Born on May 27, 1883 in Chicago, Illinois, Jessie Arms Botke studied at the Art Institute of Chicago beginning at the age of nineteen. Her professions included fashion and interior design. She later studied with Albert Herter, mural and portrait painter, and in 1911, began work at Herter Looms in New York City where she assisted Herter with tapestry design. She returned to Chicago in 1915, and married Cornelis Botke an architectural renderer. The Botkes moved to Carmel, California, in 1919. In 1923 they spent two years in Europe and returned to California first in Carmel, then settled on a ranch in Santa Paula, where she remained until her death, October 2, 1971. Her successful and distinguished career's work consisted of bold, decorative paintings of birds: as white peacocks, cockatoos, geese, swans, toucans, pheasants, and ducks. Her subjects were painted both in oil and watercolor, and she often used gold or silver leaf in the background of her paintings. Her ornithological subjects like the flora that surrounded them were painted with meticulous truth of detail. She was a member of the Carmel Art Association, California Watercolor Society, National Association of Women Artist and Chicago Society of Etching. | ||
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Donna Norine Schuster
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Born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on January 6, 1883, Donna Schuster began her art education at the Chicago Art Institute. There she graduated with honors and later continued her study under Edmund Tarbell and Frank Benson, at the Boston Museum School. In 1912 she traveled to Belgium on a painting tour with William Merritt Chase. Schuster again studied with Chase in 1914 when he instructed a summer course at the newly established Carmel Art School. She taught art at the Otis Institute in Los Angeles in the 1920s. In Laguna Beach, where she bought a home, she was very active in the art colony helping to establish the Laguna Art Association. She was also a member of California Watercolor Society and Women Painters of the West. Donna Norine Schuster died tragically on December 27, 1953 when her home in Griffith Park was swept with fire. | ||
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Marion Kavanagh Wachtel |
Marion Kavanagh Wachtel grew up amongst artistic talent. Born June 10, 1876, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, she was one of six daughters. Her great-grandfather was a Royal Academician in London and a well-known portrait painter. Her mother was also an artist. Wachtel attended the Art Institute of Chicago and studied under William Merritt Chase. She taught for several years in Chicago before she accepted an offer from the Santa Fe Railroad. Wachtel exchanged some of her sketches for transportation west, to San Francisco, where she studied under William Keith. When Keith realized she would travel to Los Angeles, he recommended that she introduce herself to another artist named Elmer Wachtel. They were later married and the two spent their years together painting throughout the canyons and diverse landscapes of California and the Southwest. In order that she not compete with her husband's success as an oil painter, she chose watercolor as her media of choice until his death in 1929 when she returned to oils. She was a member of the California Watercolor Society and Aquarelists of New York. Marion Kavanagh Wachtel died on May 22, 1954, in Pasadena, California. | ||
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Alice Brown Chittenden |
Alice Brown Chittenden moved to San Francisco as a child from her home in Brockport, New York where she was born on October 14, 1859. It was her father who encouraged her to pursue her art interest. She began her studies at the School of Design in San Francisco. In 1877, she studied with Virgil Williams at the School where she later became an instructor for over forty-years. She was briefly married to Charles Overton in 1887, which ended in divorce and she never remarried. Chittenden studied and exhibited throughout the United States, and Europe including New York, France and Italy. She remained in Pacific Heights, California until her death at the age of 85. Chittenden painted some 350 known varieties of California wildflowers for which she was best known. She also painted landscape views of Marin County and portraits of California celebrities. | ||
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Nell Walker Warner |
Floral and landscape painter, Nell Walker Warner was born April 1, 1891 in Nebraska. She was educated in Colorado Springs and Missouri before graduating from the Los Angeles School of Art & Design in 1916. After her graduation, she instructed art classes and painted backdrops for silent films. She furthered her studies under the tutelage of Nicolai Fechin, Fritz Werner and Paul Lauritz. She traveled throughout Europe and spent three summers painting in Cape Ann, Massachusetts. Here she painted many ocean and harbor scenes. La Canada, California remained her home until after her second marriage when she moved north to Carmel. She was very active in the art clubs and organizations of California and won many awards and prizes for her work until her death in l970. | ||
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Mary H. Ross |
Mary Paxton Herrick was born in San Francisco, California on September 29, 1856. As a young girl Mary's father taught her to draw. She was the first pupil to enroll in the San Francisco School of Design when it opened in 1874, where she studied with Virgil Williams. Mary and her husband Colin Ross resided in San Francisco until 1914, when they moved across the bay to Piedmont. Mary H. Ross died there on October 31, 1935. She was known for her still life and floral paintings. While her works are rare, Ross exhibited at the World's Colombian Exposition in Chicago, 1893, California Midwinter International Expo, 1894 and Mark Hopkins Institute of Art, San Francisco, 1897, amongst other local exhibitions. | ||
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Isabel Hunter |
Artist Isabel Hunter was born on November 19, 1865 in San Francisco, California. She attended and studied at the California School of Design, the Mark Hopkins Institute, and at the Art Students League in New York City. While studying at the Mark Hopkins Institute, Hunter was a student of William Keith and Emil Carlsen, Amédée Joullin. She also studied under Arthur Mathews when she attended the California School of Design. She was an illustrator for Sunset Magazine as well as a painter of northern California landscapes. Hunter was a member of the San Francisco Artists Association and the San Francisco Society of Women Artists. She died in Alameda, California in 1941. | ||
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Mary DeNeale Morgan |
Born on May 24, 1868 in San Francisco, California, Morgan's family moved to Oakland two years later. She was a talented child in drawing and as her interest grew she entered and studied at the San Francisco School of Design under Virgil Williams, Emil Carlsen, and Amédée Joullin. She also studied with William Keith and William Merritt Chase. She later taught high school art classes and opened her own studio in Oakland. Although she visited Carmel in 1903 and bought a cottage, it was not until 1910 that she settled permanently there. For years she was very active in the art scene of Monterey and Carmel, helping establish and run the Carmel Club of Arts and Crafts and the Carmel Art Association. As many women of her time, she signed her paintings with androgynous initials. This made selling work easier, particularly in a field that historically had been male dominated. She worked in oil, tempera, pastel and watercolor, painting the scenes of the Monterey Peninsula surround. She was a member of American Federation of Arts, Artist Guild, Chicago, California Watercolor Society, Laguna Beach Art Association, National Association of Women Painters and Sculptors, San Francisco Art Association and West Coast Arts. She died at the age of 80 in 1948. | ||
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Anna Althea Hills |
Born on January 28, 1882 in Ravenna, Ohio, Anna Althea Hills demonstrated talent and interest in art at a young age. She was raised in Olivet, Michigan; attended Olivet College and studied at the Chicago Art Institute, Cooper Union Art School in New York and with artist Arthur Dow. Hills taught art for two years and then traveled to Europe where she studied at the Académie Julian. There she painted in France, Holland and England. Hills arranged art education for the schools of Orange County by organizing traveling exhibitions. Anna was active in the art community of Laguna Beach where she was instrumental in the creation of the Laguna Beach Art Association's gallery and where she served as the president for six years. She was also a member of the California Art Club and Washington Watercolor Club. Anna Althea Hills died on June 13, 1930 of a heart attack. | ||
