Wayne Thiebaud, whose iconic paintings of pies, ice cream and cakes made him known across the globe and who influenced scores of artists as a professor in the Sacramento area, has died. He was 101. Thiebaud died Saturday at his home in Sacramento, the New York-based gallery Acquavella confirmed. Acquavella has held four exhibitions of Thiebaud’s work and said the artist had “still spent most days in the studio” after having lived for over a century. One of Northern California’s most celebrated artists, Thiebaud was best known for being associated with pop art and for his still-life depictions of desserts and other diner foods. But after starting his career as a cartoonist and commercial artist, Thiebaud would also go on to create paintings featuring people and landscapes – including scenes from San Francisco streets and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg said Thiebaud “remained devoted to Sacramento and its surrounding landscapes despite the pull of fame and fortune.”The Crocker Art Museum has held a Thiebaud exhibition each decade since hosting his first solo show in 1951 and last year celebrated his 100th birthday by featuring 100 works that spanned his career. “Paintings are not made to be exciting,” Thiebaud told Sactown Magazine in a preview ahead of that exhibition. “They’re quiet little visual examples of poetry. So you can’t expect much excitement, but you can expect, I hope, a display of personal feelings.”Thiebaud was also a longtime art teacher, first at Sacramento City College then later as a professor at the University of California, Davis. He was born on Nov. 15, 1920, in Mesa, Arizona, to Mormon parents and grew up in Long Beach, though he also spent time living with family in Utah, too. “Grew up in Long Beach, and I sold papers on the beach, was a lifeguard in high school,” he recalled in an online post on the Crocker Art Museum’s website. “So the beach was, and is, very much a part of my memory and my actual experience.”While working a job at a cafe in Long Beach he noticed rows of pies that would later inspire some of his famous works, he said. Thiebaud became an apprentice in the animation department at Walt Disney studios for three months until he was fired for participation in union activities, according to the Crocker Art Museum. He then enrolled at the Frank Wiggins Trade School in Los Angeles where he learned sign-painting and other commercial art skills. He went on to serve in the United States Air Force but did not become a pilot. Instead, he worked in the military as a graphic artist and cartoonist. While stationed at what was then Mather Field outside Sacramento, he produced a comic strip for Mather Field’s newspaper. He later earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in fine arts at Sacramento State College, which is now California State University, Sacramento. While a graduate student, Thiebaud began teaching at what is now Sacramento City College.He took a year-long sabbatical in New York in 1956 where he met other artists that included Willem and Elaine de Kooning, Franz Kline, and Barnett Newman, according to the Crocker Art Museum. In 1962, Thiebaud had a breakthrough New York City debut show at the Allan Stone Gallery and a solo museum show at the de Young Museum in San Francisco. One year earlier, Thiebaud began teaching in the newly formed art department at UC Davis. He continued to teach at UC Davis through 1991. Thiebaud told Sactown magazine that teaching in the Sacramento area was important to him, offering “an education because I’d not gone to art school.”“I am primarily, in my mind, just an old art teacher. I’m just so interested in things like what makes a good painting, or even a painting of some consequence,” he said. “And this kind of research is what enables any serious artist to engage, almost like a scientist. You do it primarily to find out something, to express something that hopefully hasn’t been expressed before, to give a sense of the expanding motion of what things are. So Sacramento is, overall, responsible for allowing me to do that.”Thiebaud had two daughters with his first wife Patricia Patterson, Twinka and Mallary Ann Thiebaud, who survive him. He also had a son, Paul LeBaron Thiebaud, with his second wife Betty Jean Thiebaud, who was a filmmaker and a muse to Thiebaud. Betty Jean Thiebaud died in 2015 at the family’s Land Park home in Sacramento. Thiebaud’s son Paul went on to become an art dealer who sold works by his father and other California artists. He died in 2010.Thiebaud also adopted a stepson from Betty Jean’s first marriage, Matt Bult, who is also an artist. Asked in an interview what advice he would give to a young artist, Wayne Thiebaud told Sactown Magazine it would be to “work your head off and work harder than you think you need to work.”
Wayne Thiebaud, whose iconic paintings of pies, ice cream and cakes made him known across the globe and who influenced scores of artists as a professor in the Sacramento area, has died. He was 101.
Thiebaud died Saturday at his home in Sacramento, the New York-based gallery Acquavella confirmed. Acquavella has held four exhibitions of Thiebaud’s work and said the artist had “still spent most days in the studio” after having lived for over a century.
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One of Northern California’s most celebrated artists, Thiebaud was best known for being associated with pop art and for his still-life depictions of desserts and other diner foods. But after starting his career as a cartoonist and commercial artist, Thiebaud would also go on to create paintings featuring people and landscapes – including scenes from San Francisco streets and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg said Thiebaud “remained devoted to Sacramento and its surrounding landscapes despite the pull of fame and fortune.”
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You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.
The Crocker Art Museum has held a Thiebaud exhibition each decade since hosting his first solo show in 1951 and last year celebrated his 100th birthday by featuring 100 works that spanned his career.
“Paintings are not made to be exciting,” Thiebaud told Sactown Magazine in a preview ahead of that exhibition. “They’re quiet little visual examples of poetry. So you can’t expect much excitement, but you can expect, I hope, a display of personal feelings.”
Thiebaud was also a longtime art teacher, first at Sacramento City College then later as a professor at the University of California, Davis.
He was born on Nov. 15, 1920, in Mesa, Arizona, to Mormon parents and grew up in Long Beach, though he also spent time living with family in Utah, too.
“Grew up in Long Beach, and I sold papers on the beach, was a lifeguard in high school,” he recalled in an online post on the Crocker Art Museum’s website. “So the beach was, and is, very much a part of my memory and my actual experience.”
While working a job at a cafe in Long Beach he noticed rows of pies that would later inspire some of his famous works, he said.
This content is imported from Twitter.
You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.
Thiebaud became an apprentice in the animation department at Walt Disney studios for three months until he was fired for participation in union activities, according to the Crocker Art Museum. He then enrolled at the Frank Wiggins Trade School in Los Angeles where he learned sign-painting and other commercial art skills.
He went on to serve in the United States Air Force but did not become a pilot. Instead, he worked in the military as a graphic artist and cartoonist. While stationed at what was then Mather Field outside Sacramento, he produced a comic strip for Mather Field’s newspaper.
He later earned undergraduate and graduate degrees in fine arts at Sacramento State College, which is now California State University, Sacramento.
While a graduate student, Thiebaud began teaching at what is now Sacramento City College.
He took a year-long sabbatical in New York in 1956 where he met other artists that included Willem and Elaine de Kooning, Franz Kline, and Barnett Newman, according to the Crocker Art Museum.
In 1962, Thiebaud had a breakthrough New York City debut show at the Allan Stone Gallery and a solo museum show at the de Young Museum in San Francisco.
One year earlier, Thiebaud began teaching in the newly formed art department at UC Davis. He continued to teach at UC Davis through 1991.
Thiebaud told Sactown magazine that teaching in the Sacramento area was important to him, offering “an education because I’d not gone to art school.”
“I am primarily, in my mind, just an old art teacher. I’m just so interested in things like what makes a good painting, or even a painting of some consequence,” he said. “And this kind of research is what enables any serious artist to engage, almost like a scientist. You do it primarily to find out something, to express something that hopefully hasn’t been expressed before, to give a sense of the expanding motion of what things are. So Sacramento is, overall, responsible for allowing me to do that.”
Thiebaud had two daughters with his first wife Patricia Patterson, Twinka and Mallary Ann Thiebaud, who survive him.
He also had a son, Paul LeBaron Thiebaud, with his second wife Betty Jean Thiebaud, who was a filmmaker and a muse to Thiebaud. Betty Jean Thiebaud died in 2015 at the family’s Land Park home in Sacramento.
This content is imported from Twitter.
You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.
Thiebaud’s son Paul went on to become an art dealer who sold works by his father and other California artists. He died in 2010.
Thiebaud also adopted a stepson from Betty Jean’s first marriage, Matt Bult, who is also an artist.
Asked in an interview what advice he would give to a young artist, Wayne Thiebaud told Sactown Magazine it would be to “work your head off and work harder than you think you need to work.”