Paul Landacre's Print Masterpieces

This printmaker will make everyone drool over his work, my friends. Honestly, the impulse to go "Ooooooo" can't be helped. The man's work is just superb. The person in question here is Paul Landacre. He was a Midwestern transplant to the west coast, and his prints of landscapes, or figures or still lifes are things of beauty. I defer to your viewing pleasure......

Paul Hambleton Landacre (1893-1963) was born in Columbus, Ohio. He was a part of the Southern California artistic Renaissance between the world wars and is regarded as one of the outstanding printmakers of the modern era. Landacre developed a singular style of meticulously-carved lines, and delicate cross-hatching. Many of his prints were inspired by the American West, including the hills and mountains of Big Sur, Palm Springs, Monterey, and Berkeley. The work is rich and velvety black with ink. His lines caress the contour of the Californian landscape with grace and simplicity.

Landacre attended Ohio State University until he was suddenly afflicted by an illness. To recuperate, he moved to Chula Vista, California, where he started to walk around and draw the hilly California terrain. In 1922, he moved to Los Angeles to attend the Otis Art Institute. He worked as a commercial illustrator, but became enamored with the printmaking process and devoted himself entirely to the medium from then onward. The result, no surprise, was that Landacre became one of the country’s pre-eminent printmakers.

Landacre taught art at the University of Southern California, Otis Art Institute and the Kahn Institute and held memberships in the California Society of Etchers, California Print Makers Society, American Society of Wood Engravers, and the American Society of Etchers, Gravers, Lithographers and Woodcutters. His prints were included in numerous exhibitions, including the 1939 New York World’s Fair, and are illustrated in numerous books on American printmaking. His work can be found in more than a hundred and fifty public collections throughout the United States.

In March 2006, with the growing appreciation of Landacre's artistic significance, his home was declared a City of Los Angeles landmark (Historic Cultural Monument No. 839). Landacre's papers and many of his original blocks and prints are found at the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library at UCLA.

Public Collections:
Boston Museum of Fine Arts
Library of Congress
Los Angeles Public Library
Museum of Modern Art, New York
Oakland Museum
New York Public Library
Philadelphia Museum
San Francisco, Achenbach Foundation for the Graphic Arts
Seattle Museum
Smithsonian Institute of American Art