The Brutons and Armin Hansen

Men of the Sea by Armin Hansen

1920, oil on canvas, 50.5 x 56.38 inches. Gift of Jane and Justin Dart, 1991.202

From the collection of the Monterey Museum of Art

In around 1922, Margaret Bruton went to Monterey with the intention of studying with renowned California artist Armin Hansen (1886-1957), the founder of Monterey’s art school. Hansen was a talented painter whose works often feature maritime themes--he spent several years on a Norwegian trawler before settling down near the sea in Monterey. Hansen had been introduced to modern art during his travels in Europe and embraced modernist sensibilities and techniques. He conducted informal classes from his home on El Dorado Street, in a neighborhood at the center of Monterey’s art colony. Many of his classes were held outside so that students could paint the natural beauty surrounding them. Margaret attended a summer sketch class with him where the students worked outdoors on large canvases; she later remarked:

It was more of a mutual association than a structured class. The students decided on locations and hired the models and paid Armin for his criticism. He was spared as much of the mechanics as possible. He was an excellent teacher in that he inspired his students without imposing any rigid formulas.¹

Armin Hansen
Smithsonian American Art Museum
https://2.americanart.si.edu/images/JuleyBio/J0102946_1b.jpg

Helen would later call this period the “Hansonian [sic] era” because Hansen “was going strong and he was quite an influence among the students although I don’t think on us.”²  It is also likely that Hansen, who has been described as a “master-etcher” and had an etching press in his house, introduced the Brutons to the etching process.³  All three sisters started experimenting with--and to different degrees mastering--this art form during the 1920s.

Margaret later reported that eventually the Monterey Group “broke away” from Hansen because “we all felt that he wasn’t at all progressive.”⁴  

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¹Quoted in Monterey: The Artist’s View, 1925-1945, Monterey Museum of Art, p. 12.

²Interview with Lydia Modi Vitale and Steven Gelber, 26 February 1975. From the video archive of the de Saisset Art Gallery and Museum, Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, CA.

³Julianne Burton-Carvajal, “Gus and the Gang”, in Noticias de Monterey, Summer 2005, p. 9.

⁴Interview with Terry St. John, 21 July 1972.