The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens in San Marino will host Robert Flynn Johnson, curator emeritus of the Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, on Wednesday, April 20, as he discusses how portrait artist Don Bachardy was one of the most insightful draftsmen of his era.
This in-person event, “Skill, Speed, and Diplomacy: The Artistic Achievement of Don Bachardy,” begins at 7:30 p.m. at Rothenberg Hall.
While most artists work in isolation, inventing their art from pure imagination or being inspired by landscapes or inanimate objects in their own leisurely time, Don Bachardy has always created his works from life in single intense sessions of between two to three hours. This method meant that each drawing was a true collaboration between artist and subject. Unlike other artists, this demanded not just skill but the necessary elements of diplomacy in making willing subjects comfortable while at the same time putting himself, by choice, into the pressure of completing the work with the extreme economy of time.
Donald Jess Bachardy was born in Los Angeles in 1934 and studied at the Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles and the Slade School of Art in London. His first one-man exhibition was held in London in 1961. He has since had one-man exhibitions at galleries in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Houston and New York.
Bachardy’s works reside in the permanent collections of numerous museums in the United States and Europe. Seven books of his portraits have been published.
This event is part of the Isherwood-Bachardy Lecture series at The Huntington.
Attendance is free with reservation. To reserve your spot, visit www.huntington.org/events/
For more information, call (626) 405-2100.
The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens are at 1151 Oxford Road in San Marino.
