Landscape painter. Born in Hanover, IL on December 5, 1883. Although artistically inclined at an early age, White did not pursue an art career until he was in his thirties. After receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree from Notre Dame University in 1902, he studied textile design at the Philadelphia School of Applied Arts until 1906. A few years were spent as assistant professor of chemistry at Portland University and as a textile designer in his parents’ factory, the Hanover Woolen Mills. Tiring of this line of work, he moved to Los Angeles in 1912 and worked for an interior decorating company while painting landscapes in his leisure. When his work was accepted for exhibition at the Panama- Pacific International Exposition in 1915, he decided to devote full-time to painting.

White’s art career was briefly interrupted during WW1 when he served as a second lieutenant in the 40th Engineers Camouflage. Upon discharge, he returned to Los Angeles and from that time earned his living as a landscape painter. Married in 1923, he built a studio-home in Pasadena and made regular sketching trips to Palm Springs, the Sierra, and into Mexico in search of subject matter. White died in Pasadena on April 28, 1969 having acquired national renown.

Member : Academy of Western Painters; California Art Club.

Exhibited : Panama-Pacific International Exposition, 1915; Battey Gallery, Pasadena, 1916 (first solo); Stendahl Gallery, Los Angeles; Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1940 (solo).

Awards : silver medal, Panama-California International Exposition, San Diego, 1915; Huntington prize, California Art Club, 1921.

Works held : Los Angeles County Museum of Art; State Museum, Springfield, IL; Montclair (NJ) Museum; Cleveland Art Museum.

(Source: Hughes, Edan Milton, “Artists in California: 1786-1940,” San Francisco: Hughes Publishing Company, 1989.)

Landscape Painter. Born in Bentzen, Germany on February 20, 1865. Wendt immigrated to Chicago in 1880 and studied briefly at the Art Institute of Chicago while working a commercial art shop. A self-taught painter, he became a great technician through his power of observation. Wendt was a good friend of artist Gardner Symons in Chicago and made several trips to Southern California with him between 1894 and 1906. After his marriage to sculptress Julia Bracken in 1906, the couple moved to Los Angeles and bought the studio home of the Wachtels on Sichel Street. Wendt was a cofounder and first president of the California Art Club in 1911 and he held the position for six years. In 1912, he was elected an Associate of the National Academy. In that same year, he built a studio home in Laguna Beach.

Before 1915, his paintings were characterized by light, short strokes. After that time, he used a much broader, bolder brush. Eugen Neuhaus wrote, “He sings of spring in its rich greens and more often of the joyful quality of summer in typical tawny browns, in decorative broad terms.”

Wendt’s reputation continues to soar. In 2008, the Laguna Art Museum presented a show featuring some of Wendt’s major paintings. A renowned art historian Dr. Will South co-authored an important book for the show, “In Nature’s Temple: The Life and Art of William Wendt”. It is great contribution to American art history. Wendt is considered a giant among American Artists and is often referred to as “The Dean of Southern California.” He died in Laguna Beach on December 29, 1946.

Member: American Federation of Arts; California Art Club (President); Society of Western Artists; Chicago Society of Artists; Laguna Beach Art Association; National Arts Club, New York

Exhibited: Art Institute of Chicago, 1909 (with his wife); Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1915, 1917, 1918, 1939 (solos); California- Pacific International Expo, 1935, Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939; Los Angeles Art Association, 1947 (memorial)

Awards: Dozens from 1893 including bronze medal, Buffalo Expo, 1901; silver medal, St. Louis Expo, 1904; silver medal, Panama Pacific International Exposition, 1915; grand prize, Panama-California International Expo, San Diego, 1915; Ranger prize, National Academy of Design, 1926.

Works Held: Union Club, Seattle; Herron Art Institute, Indianapolis; Cliff Dwellers Club, Chicago; Art Institute of Chicago; Cincinnati Art Museum; Laguna Museum; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Pasadena Art Institute; Pasadena Art Museum; Springville (UT) Museum; Irvine Museum, CA; Fleischer Museum, Scottsdale, AZ.

Landscape painter, illustrator. Born in Medoc, MO on January 9, 1879, Sayre worked in the lead and zinc mines and manufactured leather goods before settling on an art career. He remained a self-taught artist except for two months with J. Laurie Wallace in Omaha. His first creative job as an artist was an employee of and engraving company in Houston, TX. Ill with diphtheria, he moved to California in 1917. Traveling to California by train, he was enchanted with the Southwest desert and vowed to return which he did in 1919. For three years he lived in Arizona working for a mining company as a bookkeeper while painting in his leisure. Upon returning to California in 1922, he held his first art exhibition of 64 watercolors in San Francisco; later that year he exhibited at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. In that year he moved to Los Angeles and two years later built a home and studio in Glendale where he remained for the rest of his life. Sayre is one of California’s best known painters of the deserts and the Southwest.

Member: Pallete & Chisel Club of Chicago; Painters & Sculptors of Los Angeles (cofounder and President, 1929)

Exhibited: Bohemian Club, 1922; Glendale Chamber of Commerce, 1922 (solo); Glendale Public Library, 1962 (retrospective)

Works Held: Los Angeles County Museum of Art

(Source: Hughes, Edan Milton, “Artists in California: 1786-1940,” San Francisco: Hughes Publishing Company, 1989.)

Born in Chicago, Illinois on March 21, 1886. Rider attended the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts and during his student years there he painted for the Chicago Lyric Opera. He traveled to Europe where he studied at the Academie Colarossi and the Academe de la Grand Chaumiere in Paris, and exhibited there at the George Petite Galleries. While living in London, he painted for the London Opera at Covent Garden.

He spent several summers in Valencia, Spain, studying at the Werntz Academy of Fine Arts. It was there that he befriended noted artist Joaquin Sorolla (1863-1923), who would be a great influence on his work. They painted together on the Valencian Beach and when Sorolla died in 1923, Rider was an integral part of the funeral cortege. While in Spain, Rider’s works were exhibited at the Valencienees Court.

Rider returned to Chicago where he became an active participant in the art community. After visiting California in the late 1920s, he settled permanently there in 1931. He worked for Twentieth Century Fox and MGM studios, retiring at the age of eighty-four.

Rider painted throughout California and Mexico, seeking locales which would remind him of the color and light he had seen in Spain. His paintings are rich in color with intense, brilliant light. Many of his Spanish pictures depict the activities of fishermen on the beach in Valencia and their boats with the single, white billowing sail.

Member: Palette & Chisel Club, Chicago; Academy of Western Painters; Painters and Sculptors of Los Angeles; California Art Club; Hispanic Society; Laguna Beach Art Association.

Exhibited: Art Institute of Chicago, 1917 (Municipal Art League prize), 1925-1929; Chicago Galleries Association, 1929 (solo); California State Fair, 1936 (second prize); Golden Gate International Exhibition, 1939; California Art Club, 1940 (first prize), 1959; Circulo des Bellas Arts Spain.

Works Held: City of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois; The Fleischer Museum, Scottsdale, Arizona; The Irvine Museum, Irvine, California.

Landscape painter. Born in Philadelphia, PA on March 9, 1871. Stricken with scarlet fever, Redmond was deaf at age three. After moving with his family to San Jose, CA about 1874, he attended the Berkeley School for the Deaf from 1879-90. At that school he was greatly influenced by Theophilus D’Estrella who taught Redmond painting, drawing, pantomime and encouraged him in his art studies.

Upon graduation, he entered the San Francisco School of Design where he studied with Mathews and Joullin. There he was awarded a scholarship for further study in Paris at Academie Julian under Constant and Laurens. While in Paris he shared apartments with Gottardo Piazzoni and Douglas Tilden. Some of his early paintings done in France are signed “S. Redmond.”
Returning to California in 1898, he took up residence in Los Angeles. The years 1910-17 were spent in Northern California where he was a resident at different periods of San Mateo, Monterey County and Belvedere.

In 1917 his ability in sign language was put to good use when he became a bit player in the silent movies in Hollywood. Redmond became good friends with Charlie Chaplin and was instrumental in perfecting Chaplin’s pantomime technique. He had a studio on the Chaplin movie lot and appeared in several of his movies, the most memorable role being the sculptor in “City Lights.” He also had a feature role in “You’d be Surprised.”

Redmond wrote, “The highest tribute paid to an artist is the reflection of man’s noblest work–to inspire.” One of the foremost exponents of Impressionism in California, he is internationally known for his landscapes of rolling hills of poppies and lupines as well as coastals, moonlit scenes and seascapes.

Member: Bohemian Club; San Francisco Art Association; California Art Club; Laguna Beach Art Association.
Exhibited: Paris Salon, 1895; Del Monte Gallery, Monterey, 1911, 1913; Panama Pacific International Exposition, 1915; Oakland Museum, 1989 (retrospective).
Awards: gold medal, School of Design; medal, Louisiana Purchase Expo, 1904; silver medal, Alaska-Yukon Expo, Seattle, 1909.
Works Held: Bancroft Library, UC Berkeley, California School for the Deaf, Fremont; Laguna Museum, Los Angeles County Museum of Art; New York City Museum; Mills College Art Gallery; Oakland Museum; Stanford University Museum; Springville (Utah) Museum Art; National Center of Deafness; California State University, Northridge; de Young Museum; Jonathan Club, Los Angeles.

(Source: Hughes, Edan Milton, “Artists in California: 1786-1940,” San Francisco: Hughes Publishing Company, 1989.)

Painter. Born in San Antonio, TX on September 9, 1884, the daughter of English immigrants, William and Amelia Palmer. The Palmer family moved to California in 1886. Elsie grew up in Oakland and graduated from high school in San Francisco. After studying locally at the Best Art School, she worked as a commercial artist. He work took her to Chicago where she married artist Edgar Payne in 1912. The couple made several trips to California in the intervening years before settling in Laguna Beach in November 1917. The Paynes traveled and exhibited throughout Europe (1922-24) and, while there, her work was highly praised by the French critics. The Paynes permanently moved to Beverly Hills in 1932 and separated the following year. Maintaining residences in Laguna and Los Angeles, Elsie established the Elsie Palmer Art School in Beverly Hills in 1934. Working with watercolor, oil and tempera, she produced florals, landscapes and portraits in a flat illustrative style. Mrs. Payne moved to her daughter’s home in Minneapolis, MN in 1969 and died there on June 17, 1971.

Studied : Best’s Art School, San Francisco; Chicago Academy of Fine Arts.

Member : Laguna Beach art Association ( a founder); Women Painters of the West ( a founder); California Art Club; California Watercolor Society; Artists of the Southwest; Society for Sanity in Art; National Society of Arts and Letters; American Artists Professional League.

Exhibited : Art Institute of Chicago, 1913, 1916; Paris, 1925; National Association of Women Artists, 1930; National Academy of Design, 1930; Ebell Club, Los Angeles, 1932-42, 1943 (prize); California Watercolor Society; Riverside Museum, 1941-43, 1944; Laguna Beach Art Association, 1951 (prize); Los Angeles county Museum of Art, 1941, 1942 (prize), 1943, 1944 (prize); California Art Club, 1943 (prize); Greek Theatre, Los Angeles, 1948 (prize), 1949 (prize); Pasadena Art Institute, 1950 (prize); Laguna Beach Art Festival, 1952 (prize).

Works held : public schools in Laguna Beach and Los Angeles; bronze plaque, entrance to Laguna Beach Art Gallery.

Sources : WW59; WW47; Hughes, Artists of California, 428; Trenton, ed. Independent Spirits.

Landscape painter, muralist. Born in Washburn, MO on March 1, 1883. Payne left home at age 14 and found work painting houses, stage sets and signs. His travels took him through the Ozarks and into Mexico. Except for a brief period at the Art Institute of Chicago, he remained a self-taught artist.

On his first visit to California in 1909 he spent several months painting in Laguna Beach before visiting San Francisco. While in San Francisco, he met artist Elsie Palmer whom he married in Chicago in 1912. In 1917 he returned to Glendale, CA with a commission from Chicago’s Congress Hotel for a mural of 11,000 square yards of muslin which was accomplished with the help of other local artists and installed shortly thereafter.

In 1918 the Paynes established a home and studio in Laguna Beach, where he organized and became the first president of the local art association. He continued painting and exhibiting in Los Angeles and Laguna until 1922 when he and Elsie began a two-year painting tour of Europe. During the next few years their winter residence was mainly in and around New York City. Payne is internationally famous for his canvases depicting Indians riding through desert canyons and landscapes of the Sierra Nevada and Harbor scenes of France & Italy. He produced a color motion picture called Sierra Journey, and Payne Lake in the High Sierra is named for him.

Member: Salmagundi Club; Allied Art Association; International Society Art League; California Art Club (President 1926); Laguna Beach Art Association; Ten Painters of Los Angeles; Palette & Chisel Club, 1913; Chicago Society of Artists; American Artists Professional League; Carmel Art Association.
Exhibited: California State Fairs, 1917 (prize),1918 (prize); Sacramento State Fair, 1918 (gold); Sacramento, 1919 (medal); Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1919 (solo), 1926 (gold medal); Art Institute of Chicago, 1920 (prize); Southwest Museum, 1921 (prize); Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts Annual,1921,22,25; Paris Salon, 1923; National Academy of Design, 1929 (prize); Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939; California Art Club, 1947 (prize).
Works Held: murals, Empress Theatre & American Theatre, Chicago; Clay County Court House, Brazil, IN; Hendricks County Court House, Danville, IN; Queen Theatre, Houston; Nebraska Art Association, Lincoln; Peoria Society of Allied Artists; Herron Art Institute; Municipal Art Commission; Janesville (WI) Art Association; Indianapolis Museum; Laguna Art Museum; Bancroft Library, UC Berkeley; National Academy of Design; National Museum of American Art, Washington D.C.; Pasadena Art Institute; Pasadena Art Museum; Southwest Museum of Los Angeles; Springville (UT) Museum of Art; University of Nebraska Galleries; Art Institute of Chicago; Oakland Museum; Irvine Museum, CA.

A painter in a highly detailed, traditional style, Ernest Narjot painted landscapes, mining scenes, portraits, and several murals for churches and public buildings. By the 1880s, he was considered one of California’s foremost painters and also illustrated books of early California life.

Born in St. Malo, France on Dec. 25, 1826. Christened Ernest Etienne Narjot de Francheville, he was raised in an artistic atmosphere and taught to paint by both parents who were artists. Narjot studied art in Paris before joining the Gold Rush to California in 1849. After three unsuccessful years in the Mother Lode area, he joined a mining expedition to Sonora, Mexico. For 13 years he mined and painted scenes along the border of Mexico and Arizona. Narjot returned to San Francisco in 1865 with his Mexican wife and set up a studio at 610 Clay Street.

By the 1880s he was considered one of California’s foremost painters. His paintings were meticulously detailed and rendered in the traditional style of the mid-19th century French School of painting. His work includes mining scenes, landscapes, portraits and several murals in churches and public buildings of Northern California. Narjot was commissioned to paint the ceiling of Leland Stanford’s tomb at Stanford University and, while working there, paint splashed his eyes. His eyesight was temporarily affected, however, he later recovered to paint many of his best paintings. Narjot died in San Francisco on Aug. 24, 1898. His works are rare since many of his paintings were destroyed in the earthquake and fire of 1906.

Member: San Francisco Art Association

Exhibited: San Francisco Art Association, 1874; Mechanics’ Institute., 1876, 1893; California State Fair, 1888 (gold medal), 1889 (silver medal); Chicago World’s Colombian Exposition, 1893.
Works Held: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Oakland Museum; Bancroft Library, University of California Berkeley; Silverado Museum, St. Helena, CA (portrait of R.L. Stevenson); de Young Museum.

(Source: Hughes, Edan Milton, “Artists in California: 1786-1940,” San Francisco: Hughes Publishing Company, 1989.)

Painter. Born in York, Pennsylvania on June 18, 1888. Mitchell spent his childhood in New Jersey. As a teenager he prospected for gold and drove a stage coach in Nevada. He settled in San Diego about 1909 and studied at the San Diego Academy of Art (1913) under Maurice Braun. In 1916 he entered the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts for further training. After his academic training and a tour of Europe on a scholarship, in 1920 he returned to San Diego where he remained for the rest of his life. His paintings done during his student days (pre-1920) were often signed “Fred Mitchell”. One of San Diego’s most renowned painters and teachers, he died there on November 9, 1972.

Member: Contemporary Artists of San Diego; Laguna Beach Art Association; La Jolla Art Association (Co-founder); San Diego Art Guild (President 1922-23); Chula Vista Art Guild; California Art Club.

Exhibited: Panama-Pacific Exposition, 1915 (silver medal); Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Annual, 1920 (Bok prize),1927; Painters and Sculptors of Los Angeles, 1923; California State Fair, 1930; San Diego Artists Guild, 1926 (prize); Wilmington, DE, 1920; California-Pacific International Exposition, 1935, 1936; Golden Gate International Exposition, 1939; Buck Hill Art Association, 1939 (prize); Laguna Beach Art Association, 1940 (prize); San Diego Fine Arts Society; Chula Vista Artists Guild, 1945 (prize), 1946 (prize); San Diego County Fair, 1950 (prize), 1951 (prize); Fiesta Del Pacifico, 1956 (prize); La Jolla Art Center, 1956 (prize); San Diego Art Institute, 1956 (Award of Distinction), 1960 (first prize). Award: Cresson traveling scholarship, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, 1920.

Works held: University of Oregon Medical School; Van Nuys High School; San Diego Public Library; Reading Museum; San Diego Fine Arts Society; University Club, San Diego; YMCA & YWCA, San Diego; San Diego Museum of Man; Evening High School; Blanden Mem. Gal., Ft. Dodge, IA; Ohio Wesleyan University; Hahnemann medical Col., Philadelphia, PA; University of West Virginia.

Sources: Sunlight and Shadow : The Art of Alfred R. Mitchell, San Diego Historical Society, 1988; Plein Air Painters (Ruth Westphal); Southern California Artists (Nancy Moore); Dictionary of American Painters, Engravers & Sculptors (Fielding); American Art Annual 1929-33; Who’s Who in American Art 1936-62; Artists of the American West (P & H Samuels, 327-gives alternate birthdate of 1886); Falk, Exhibition Record Series. Hughes, Artists in California, 383. —

Painter. Born in Kreuznach, on the Nahe, Germany on November 18, 1863. After being drafted into the German army, Mannheim deserted and fled to France where he studied art at Ecole Delecluse, Academie Colarossi, and with DeLancey and Bouguereau. Having learned book binding early in life, he used this trade to support himself while studying art in Paris. Upon immigrating to Illinois in the 1880’s, he painted portraits in Chicago and taught in a Decatur art school. Shortly after the turn of the century, he accepted a position at Frank Brangwyn’s school in London where he remained for two years. After returning to the U.S. he taught at the Denver Art School and, in 1908 made his final move to Pasadena and built a home in the Arroyo Seco. Mannheim maintained a studio in the Blanchard Building in Los Angeles where he exhibited and taught and in 1913 founded the Stickney Memorial School of Fine Arts in Pasadena. In Paris, his work consisted mainly of figure studies and it was not until his move to the U.S. that he began painting the brighter landscapes for which he is nationally known.

Member: Laguna Beach Art Association; Pasadena Fine Arts Club; Long Beach Art Association; California Art Club

Exhibited: Del Monte Art Gallery; Paris Salon; Nationial Academy of Design; Blanchard Gallery, 1909; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1915, 1917, 1922; Golden Gate International Exhibition, 1939 (oil , self-portrait).

Awards: Gold Medal, Seattle Exposition, 1909; Gold and Silver Medals, Panama-California Exposition, San Diego, 1915.

Works Held: Laguna Museum of Art; Long Beach Museum of Art; Springville (UT) Museum of Art; Denver Museum; Irvine Museum; Fleischer Museum, (Scottsdale, AZ).