Claremont PST Celebration 2011-2012

Claremont Modern: The Artists of the GI Bill

February 17-26, 2012

The third in our series, CLAREMONT MODERN: The Artists of the GI Bill examined the impact of the GI Bill on the Claremont art community.

Millard Sheets was Chair of the Scripps Art Department 1931-1954. Scripps College Photo Archive.

As soldiers returned from WWII, the opportunity to study art was made possible by funding from the GI Bill. Some came to the Pomona College Art Department and stayed on. Millard Sheets developed the Graduate School Masters of Fine Art program in 1943-44 and admitted many talented GIs to study with art professors on the Scripps campus. These young men were older, more experienced with a focus and determination to pursue careers in art. The vision of Millard Sheets combined with the enthusiast energy of these GIs transformed Claremont into a vibrant art center at mid-century.

The Exhibition CLAREMONT MODERN: The Artists of the GI Bill will focus on a pivotal point in the history of the Claremont art community from 1945-1960. It will feature Claremont area artists who served in WWII, returned to study art with funding from the GI Bill and pursued a lifetime career in the arts.

It will include works by Karl Benjamin, Paul Darrow, Rupert Deese, Carl Hertel, James Hueter, Anthony Ivins, Roger Kuntz, Doug McClellan, Harrison McIntosh, David Scott, Paul Soldner, John Svenson and Melvin Wood. The Exhibition will be displayed for eight days in the Claremont Heritage Ginger Elliott Exhibition Space located in Memorial Park behind the Garner House.

Karl Benjamin. served in the Navy from 1943-45.	Karl Benjamin, Untitled, Oil on Masonite, 1954.
John Svenson, Army Air Corps 1942. served as a mechanic/flight engineer in North Africa.	John Svenson, Crab with Starfish, English Walnut, created in the 1950s and completed in 2004.
James Hueter on bivouac with the Army in southern Arizona in 1943.	James Hueter, Eyes, Nose and Re-Bar, Mixed Media, 1973.
Harrison McIntosh in his Army uniform with a family member, c.1942.	Harrison McIntosh, Bottle Vase, Stoneware, 1961

Claremont Modern: Post-War California Dreaming

October 9–30

The home and studio of Karl Benjamin will be on the Heritage Home tour on October 9. Photo by Louie Rios.

The annual Claremont Heritage Home Tour highlighted examples of Claremont’s exceptional and unique mid- 20th century residential architecture. The tour included a home designed by Richard Neutra and the homes of artists Karl Benjamin and Harrison McIntosh designed by Fred McDowell. David Shearer curated the accompanying exhibition in the Ginger Elliot gallery which looked at how home design was integrated with local arts, crafts and furnishings for the modern lifestyle.

Claremont was fertile ground for the new thinking in art and design in the years after World War II. Hidden among the Victorian and Arts & Crafts-era homes are modernist masterpieces by the likes of Cliff May, A. Quincy Jones, Theodore Criley, Buff and Hensman etc.; the tour will include homes by distinguished architects and designers such as Richard Neutra, Foster Rhodes Jackson, Fred McDowell and Everett Tozier. Significant modern artists, including painter Karl Benjamin and ceramicist Harrison McIntosh, also worked in Claremont in those years in a unique environment that fostered collaborations between artists and designers.

The remarkable confluence of these artists and architects had a profound and lasting impact upon the broader movement of Southern California Modernism. Few places of such small geographic area have produced such a plethora of outstanding work across so many disciplines as did Claremont in the 1940s, ‘50s and 60’s.

Claremont Modern: The Fiesta Artists of Padua Hills 1953-1959

November 13-December 18

Tony Ivins and Robert Fleck were among the Fiesta artists in 1959. The 8th Annual Padua Hills Art fiesta will be held on November 13.

The Claremont Museum of Art recreated the Padua Hills Art Fiesta held annually from 1953 through 1959. It featured an outdoor art fair with invited artists selling their work, art and craft demonstrations, folk music, festival foods and an indoor display of historic photos, documents and artwork. In conjunction with this event, an exhibition with artworks by the original Fiesta artists will be presented in the Ginger Elliot gallery.

Milford Zornes was the Director of the Padua Hills Art Institute in the 1950s and initiated the popular Art Fiesta. His daughter Maria Zornes Baker is curating the Fiesta Artists exhibition. Living artists who participated in the 1950s are: Karl Benjamin, Paul Darrow, Betty Davenport Ford, James Hueter, Doug McClellan, Harrison McIntosh, James Strombotne, John Svenson and Jack Zajac. Sioux Bally-Maloof is producing a a series of photographic portraits of these remaining Fiesta artists. Historic material and artwork from the families of Rupert Deese, Phil Dike, Carl & Sue Hertel, Roger Kuntz, Sam Maloof, Walter Mix, Hildred Reents, Millard Sheets, Paul Soldner, Albert Stewart, Melvin Wood, Robert Wood, Milford Zornes and others will be included.

The studio art movement that flourished here in the 1950s centered on the use of natural materials and traditional sensibilities – watercolor, pottery, woodworking, sculpture in stone, bronze and ceramic, mosaic, textiles as well as painting. Distinctions between art and craft were fundamentally ignored. The openness of the land and the free-thinking spirit of the times allowed Claremont artists to flourish. Here they developed a Modern aesthetic with a craftsman influence.