Dali became a Disney fan because of the surrealist ideas utilized in Walt's early Silly Symphony series between 1929 and 1939 and the brilliance of Fantasia in 1939.

Soon afterward, Dali settled on the subject and title for their collaboration. After scouring Disney's vast music library, he chose Ray Gilbert and Armando Dominguez’s ballad “Destino.” He was taken by the title "Destino," as he had long been interested in exploring ideas of destiny.

Although it isn't recorded anywhere, perhaps Dali, at some level, believed he and Disney were destined to work together. At the time of their meeting, Salvador was 46 and Walt 44. They were both young and fabulously successful artists. Each of them respected the other's creative spirit and body of work, and both shared in what Associated Press writer Michael Liedtke termed, "a fascination with the fantastic."

Dali described the story as "A magical exposition of life in the labyrinth of time," while Walt saw it as "A simple love story -- boy meets girl." Walt felt the characters were the most important element while Dali saw the characters as enigmatic dreams wrapped in symbolism. After nearly a year of work, the partnership faltered, and work on Destino ceased. Although they did not succeed in their collaboration, Dali and Disney remained friends. Disney

In 1903, a large San Francisco 17 year old lad, nearly six feet tall and weighing nearly 250 lbs, began his formal art studies at the Mark Hopkins Institute with Arthur Mathews. Young Armin Hansen continued his studies in Germany at the Stuttgart Royal Academy and the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich. While in Europe, he was exposed to the museums and art life in Paris, Amsterdam and Bruges.

At his heart, Armin Hansen loved using paint to tell the story of men making their living from the sea. He became internationally known for his scenes along the California Coast, paintings with broad masses of bold color, often painted with broken brush strokes, with dynamic composition and the elimination of superfluous detail, all done to tell the tale of man's physical relationship to nature. To better get an deeper understanding of his chosen subject, he worked as a deck hand on several commercial ocean voyages, including a Norwegian steam fishing trawler where his size and physical strength were welcomed.

In 1915, LA Times art critic Antony Andersen wrote, "Looking at the paintings of Armin Hansen, you will at once and inevitably conclude that the painter of such big men and breezy seas must be big and breezy himself. No other sort of man could possibly have done them. ... You will be right, for Armin Hansen is big and young and strong -- the living embodiment of his own pictures."

When he returned from his studies in Europe, he taught at U. C. Berkeley. During this period, he worked in both painting and etching in a style of impressionism. In 1913, Armin Hansen moved to Carmel. It had been seven years since the '06 Quake, and many of San Francisco's artists relocated to Monterey and Carmel, making it a budding art colony. Armin enjoyed the company of other artists and was one of the founding members of the Carmel Art Association.

By the 1920's, Armin Hansen used his Monterey residence to host friends and fellow artists, including members of Oakland's Society of Six, a group of East Bay artists who embraced Fauvism:  Selden Connor Gile, August Gay, Maurice Logan, Louis Siegriest, Bernard von Eichman, and William Clapp. He also became a great art teacher. Among his students were C.S. Price, August Francois Gay and E. Charton Fortune.

He also taught at the Chouinard and Otis Art Institutes where one of his students was Bodega Bay Heritage Gallery's Ruth Manerva Bennett.

By the 1920's, Armin Hansen had arrived as one of California's most successful scene painters. In 1926, he became an Associate Member of the National

Academy of Design in New York. Some reviewers began referring to Armin Hansen as the Winslow Homer of the West.

After WW II, there was a movement to renovate Monterey's Fisherman's Wharf. At the time, some felt the wharf area was blighted and had outlived its usefulness and was becoming an eyesore.

Armin Hansen and the art community helped defend the wharf from destruction, siting that the wharf was a large part of their artistic life. Having served as a sailor, he identified with the simple life of a fisherman. Hansen and his band of Bohemian artists stressed the heritage, flavor and beauty of the wharf and worked for its preservation. In the end, they prevailed over the bigger business interests.

Armin Hansen's obituary in 1957 quoted him summing up his painting career. He said, "Every move I have made and everything I have done, has always been to go back to the sea and to the men who give it its romance. I love them all." In 1997, Jack Lemon narrated a documentary entitled Time Captured in Paintings; the Monterey Legacy. The film featured Armin Hansen along with E. Charlton Fortune, William Ritschel and Xavier Martinez.

The Crocker's exhibition "Armin Hansen: The Artful Voyage" opened June 28th, and runs through October 11, 2015. Armin Hansen at his heart is a storyteller able to create compelling narratives.

The exhibition includes 100 works, including oils on canvas, watercolors, and etchings.  It is organized by the Pasadena Museum of California Art in collaboration with the staff of the Crocker Art Museum.

But in his day, Turner was not praised by everyone. Traditionalists thought he had taken leave of form altogether. Some mused he was losing his eyesight. His work seemed to embrace chaotic light and life, blurring the lines of well cemented ideas of the hierarchy of art. While traditional classicism and genre painting were held in higher regard, Turner's art was challenging, a thing to be resisted.

The traditionalists believed neoclassical paintings were noble for they told stories with mythological and Biblical themes. They also held that genre painting, works of ordinary people living their ordinary lives, were worthy and should be held in high regard, for they could portray nobility in the comings and goings of daily life.

But subjects of portraiture, landscape, and stilllife were viewed as painting utilitarian exercises. Yes, they were paintings, but without much reason for being. Those firmly cemented in the ideas and traditions of neoclassicism found themselves blind-sided by Turner's brilliance. Turner believed landscape painting to be at least the equal of neoclassical painting.

Drama? His is works had it. Turner's power, movement, and explosions of color shocked the art establishment of his day.

Although controversial, Turner was highly successful during his long painting career. He sold well and was free of money worries. His works were exhibited while he was still in his teens. He died at age 76, and left more than 19,000 works to the British nation.

Most of these works are presently in the collections of the National Gallery and the Tate Gallery in London.

Turner added his voice to the popular cause of abolition. Although slavery was banned in the Empire in 1833, he exhibited The Slave Ship In 1840 (incidentally the year Claude Monet was born). Twenty-one years before the United States' Civil War, Turner wanted to see the practice banned world wide. He had just read The History and Abolition of the Slave Trade by Thomas Clarkson. This shockingly gruesome painting shows the slave ship Zong just after the captain ordered 133 slaves to be thrown overboard so that insurance payments could be collected.

J. M. W. Turner is receiving lots of attention lately. Recently, the 2014 film Mr. Turner competed for the Palme d'Or at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Timothy Spall won an award for Best Actor and Dick Pope won an award for Best Cinematography. On June 20th, the de Young Museum opened its J. M. W. Turner, Painting Set Free exhibition.

The exhibition offers the first major survey of Turner’s late career, paintings which display a fierce engagement with grand themes of nature, history, and religion.

Our Gallery Hours are from 12:00 P.M. to 4:00 P.M., Wednesday through Sunday. We are also available for scheduled appointments, especially for those who wish to view the gallery on Mondays or Tuesdays. Please call Dan at the gallery and schedule a visit, or call him on his cellphone, 510-414-9821.

Bentonville, AR
Crystal Bridges
Museum of American Art