MONTEREY, CA.- The Monterey Museum of Art presents a new exhibition of works by San Francisco Bay area artist Beth Van Hoesen (1926–2010). Beth Van Hoesen will be on view February 1-May 19, 2013 at the Monterey Museum of Art-Pacific Street, 559 Pacific Street, Monterey, CA 93940. www.montereyart.org

Beth Van Hoesen earned recognition as a major figure in twentieth century printmaker by having mastered drawing and printmaking. Demonstrating a prolific and a keen eye for detail, Van Hoesen’s renderings of animals, portraits, landscapes, and flowers appear simplistic yet capture the subject’s inherent, unique qualities. Working from live models, the artist’s application of fine-tuned lines and careful tonal progressions developed through a precise process. Van Hoesen began with multiple preparatory drawings using graphite on paper, colored pencils, and watercolor before committing final decisions into etchings for her final prints. Though she followed a rich tradition of still-life and portraiture, a contemporary style and decorative elements within her compositions are interpretive, and divulge a psychological connection with the viewer. Her forms are raw yet refined, and border more on a naturalist perspective, capturing the integrity and unpretentiousness of the subject.

Beth Van Hoesen at the Monterey Museum of Art will encompass preparatory drawings in graphite, gouche, ink; and prints including etchings, drypoints, aquatints, and lithographs. All works in this exhibition are courtesy of the E. Mark Adams and Beth Van Hoesen Adams Trust.

Beth Van Hoesen died in San Francisco on November 16, 2010 at the age 84. She was born in 1926 in Boise, Idaho and her family moved to California when she was a child. In 1944 she enrolled at Stanford University to study fine arts, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1948.

After graduating from Stanford, she traveled to France and studied at the École des Beaux Arts de Fontainbleau in 1948, the Académie Julian and Académie de la Grand Chaumière in Paris from 1948 to 1950. In 1951 she enrolled at the California School of Fine Arts in San Francisco (now San Francisco Art Institute) where figurative painter David Park and abstract expressionist Clyfford Still were among her influential teachers. Park became a major influence on Van Hoesen, inspiring her to eschew abstraction for the expressive realism seen in her exquisite nudes, portraits, still lifes, and animal studies.

At CSFA she met artist and designer Mark Adams, and they married in 1953. In 1955, she traveled with Adams to St. Céré-Aubusson, France, where Adams had an apprenticeship with tapestry artist Jean Lurçat. After a year of study and travel in France, they returned to San Francisco, and in 1957-58 she attended classes at San Francisco State College. She began to receive recognition for her drawings and intaglio prints, including a solo exhibition of drypoints at Stanford Art Gallery, Stanford University in 1957.