John Bond Francisco was born in Cincinnati, Ohio on Dec. 14, 1863 and died January 8, 1931 in Los Angeles, California. He was a serious student of both the violin and painting. To begin his formal training, Francisco would travel to Munich to continue his studies in music and begin painting under Nauen Schule at the Berlin Academy. He would then spend several years in Paris studying painting. Francisco was accepted to study at the Academie Julian under French masters William A. Bouguereau, Gustave Courtois, and Robert-Fleury. He was then accepted at the Academie Colarossi to study under Thomas Couture and Jean Ande Rixens. The disciplines he developed during this important period of his young career would aid him becoming one of California's most important artists.

In 1887, after completing his European studies J. Bond Francisco would travel to California and settle in Los Angeles. He became a major cultural figure, performing as a violinist, painting, teaching and entertaining in his home ans studio, which he build at 1401 Albany Street. Combining an art and music career, Francisco helped form the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra in 1897 and served as their first concertmaster.

His first exhibition in Los Angeles in 1892 was almost exclusively figural studies reminiscent of his Julian Academie days in Paris. An outstanding painting "The Sick Child" (See Smithsonians National Gallery "The Critics Choice") and "In the Garden" (below - Bell Wright Museum) were "notable for clear drawing, beautiful textures and skillful painting..."

In 1899, he opened his academy of art and while continuing studio painting (figural and portraits) he began to experience the lure of California's countryside. Initially, Francisco incorporated his Munich technique with that of the Barbizon's influence to produce paintings of California deserts and mountains that held dramatic light and shade contrasts. He and his pupil Elmer Wachtel would hitch up a team and drive out for a days painting, often accompanied by students or colleagues. His love of the mountains led him into membership in the Squirrel Inn Club, which owned considerable acreage in the virgin timberland of San Bernardino ranges. Here members built their own cabins and here Francisco hunted, fished and painted.

As he concentrated more and more on California landscape, the Barbizon style brightened into the lighter palette of impressionism. Critical comment published in 1935 claimed, "He introduced into Southern California something of the grandiose manner and the panoramic subject matter of the early San Francisco group." In 1906, the Santa Fe Railroad recognized his talents as a landscape painter and commissioned Francisco to paint a series of scenes of the Grand Canyon to be used to promote the region and the railroad.

Millier wrote that in his later years, Francisco "&felt more strongly the spell of the desert, painting its blue distances and warm yellow light in New Mexico, Arizona and California, enjoying the opportunity it gives to work in clear, limpid color and atmosphere." Published notices show that he exhibited frequently for three decades, and his paintings sold well, commanding high prices.

J. Bond Francisco was a participant in art community both locally and internationally. He was a member of most of the Californias art organizations, served on the Chicago Worlds Fair jury in 1893, and was invited as a guest to visit the American Artists Club in Munich and in return he hosted their visit at his Albany Street home and studio.

Franciscos home became the social, artistic, and theatrical mecca for all of Los Angeles. Every notable musician, artist, editor and actor who came to Los Angeles was entertained in the spacious warm Francisco home and studio. Celebrities like Sarah Berhardt, Victor Herbert, and Lillian Russell were frequent guests at the grand parties hosted by the artist and his wife.

Member: Laguna Beach Art Association; Los Angeles Art Association; Painters & Sculptors of Los Angeles, Southern California Art Association.

Exhibited: California Building, Worlds Columbian Exposition and Chicago, 1893.

Museum: Los Angeles County Museum; University of California at Los Angeles

Listed: American Art Annual; Whos Who in California; Whos Who in the Pacific Southwest; Plein Air Painters of the Southland, by Ruth Westphal; Artists in California 1786-1940, by Edan Milton Hughes, vol. II, page 190; Dictionary of American Painters, Engravers & Sculptors, Mantle Fielding; Southern California Artists, by Nancy Moore; E. Benezit ; Art Across America, Two centuries of Regional Painting, by William H. Gerdts, Vol. III.

Biography courtesy of Roughton Galleries, www.antiquesandfineart.com/roughton