'California Colors': Hanson Puthuff at Pasadena Museum of California Art

Pasadena, CA - The Pasadena Museum of California Art (PMCA) is pleased to present California Colors: Hanson Puthuff, an intimate look at Hanson Puthuff (1875-1972), an American Impressionist who painted primarily in California.  Organized by the PMCA, California Colors is an exhibition showcasing a selection of Puthuff’s best work found in private Southern California collections, and will be the inaugural show for a new monographic series at the PMCA focusing on different pleinair artists.  On exhibition October 15, 2006 – January 7, 2007.

This is the first museum exhibition focusing exclusively on the work of Puthuff, who is often grouped with contemporaries such as William Wendt and Franz Bischoff, although Puthuff is specifically known for his clear, bright colors and vivid landscape compositions.  Coming to Los Angeles after growing up in Denver, Puthuff went on to become the founder of the Art Students League of Los Angeles, and a charter member of The California Art Club.

His natural talent made him a highly successful painter during his lifetime, and he received many commissions for murals, one of which was for three backgrounds for the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial in the American Museum of Natural History, New York, which he completed in 1938.  Puthuff remains one of the most widely collected American Impressionists by museums and private individuals today.

The exhibition will feature twenty five of the artist’s most important paintings, including three from the Joan Irvine Smith collection, as well as the artist’s personal effects on loan from his estate.  In addition, the PMCA will republish the artist’s autobiography, with an introduction by Jean Stern, Executive Director of the Irvine Museum.

Visit The Pasadena Museum of California Art (PMCA) at : www.pmcaonline.org/