McCOMAS, FRANCIS (1875-1938)

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"View Of The City" (1898)

watercolour

signed lower right

*private collection, Melbourne

McComas is a forgotten Australian Impressionist, & Father of Californian Modernism. He was born in Tasmania, but studied art at the Sydney Technical College and the Sydney Art School. At the height of the popularity of Australian Impressionism & the Heidelberg School, McComas set sail for San Francisco in 1898, having worked his way across the Pacific as a merchant seaman. His first paintings in America were inspired by Californian Tonalism, & he had the first of many exhibitions at the Vickery Gallery in San Francisco, a show that consisted of works from the South Seas and the California coast. McComas soon became known for his haunting watercolors of the Monterey Cypress and California Live Oaks that dotted the hillsides of the region. By 1904 his paintings were selling in Chicago, Boston & New York as well as San Francisco. In the summer of 1909 McComas was diagnosed with tuberculosis. When he went to the dry Arizona desert to recover, he found the Indian ruins and the monumental canyons to be a colorful new subject that inspired him as a painter. He was one of the few California artists invited to exhibit in the 1913 International Exhibition of Modern Art in New York. The 1915 San Francisco World’s Fair was a great triumph for the Australian & an entire gallery was devoted to his works and he was a favorite of the jurors. Between 1918 & 1921 he won awards at the Philadelphia Water Color Club, American Water Color Society (New York), & Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. In 1923 he was hired by Cecil B. DeMille to design the sets for the Biblical epic, The Ten Commandments. His friends included Jack London, William Keith & Charlie Chaplin, & he liased with other artists including Diego Rivera & Jose Clemente Orozco. His portrait was taken by another friend, Dorothea Lange. He remains a major figure in Monterrey art history. Despite his immense fame & success in America, McComas remains forgotten completely here in Australia. Few major (or minor) collections hold his art.