Dorr Bothwell Art

Bay Area Surrealist artist Dorr Hodgson Bothwell (1902-2000). Gouache on paper circa 1950 surrealist abstract. Bothwell attended the California School of Fine Arts (CSFA) later to be...

This is a gouache or watercolor painting. signed and dated. it depicts poppies and some other wildflowers.. Dorr Hodgson Bothwell (May 3, 1902 – September 24, 2000) was an American artist, designer, educator, and world-traveller. She was born in San Francisco, California. She began her art career at the California School of Fine Arts in 1921, under the tutelage of Gottardo Piazzoni and Rudolph Schaeffer. Bothwell's travels began in 1928, after her father died. She spent 1928 and 1929 living and working in Samoa, then spent another two years in Europe before resettling in San Diego in 1932, where she married her childhood friend, sculptor Donal Hord. Separating from Hord, she moved to Los Angeles in 1934, joining the post-surrealist group around Lorser Feitelson and Helen Lundeberg, and participating in the mural division of the Federal Arts Project, (WPA) where she learned the art of screenprinting, which would become her favored graphic technique. She returned to San Francisco in 1942. She traveled to Paris in 1949/51, to Africa in 1966/67, to England, France and the Netherlands in 1970, to Bali, Java and Sumatra in 1974, and to China and Japan in 1982/85. In 1968, Dorr Bothwell and Marlys Mayfield wrote Notan – on the Interaction of Positive and Negative Spaces. It was first reissued in 1976, and the first Danish translation was published in 1977. In 1991 the book was republished by Dover Publications as Notan: The Dark-Light Principle of Design; it has been in print continuously since then. Bothwell taught at the San Francisco Art Institute for many years where she focused closely on theories of color. She taught as an instructor of design at the CSFA from 1944-48 and 1953-58, Parsons School Design in New York in 1952, after which she further studied in Paris. She returned to the states and taught at the SFAI from 1959-61, Mendocino Art Center from 1961-97, and Ansel Adams Photography Workshop in Yosemite National Park from 1964-78. Artists Robert Hudson...