Loren Roberta Barton (1893-1975) Loren Barton, an artist known first for her etchings, book illustrations, and later her paintings in both oil and watercolors, was born in Oxford, Massachusetts and raised in Los Angeles, California. She attended art school at the University of Southern California and the Art Students League in Los Angeles. For many years, she was a teacher at the Chouinard Art Institute.

Loren Barton was a great-niece of Clara Barton, the founder of the Red Cross.

Ms. Bartons frequent travels to the East Coast and Europe can be noted in her artwork. Her subjects include portraits, still-lifes and landscapes from scenes and people in Europe, Mexico and many regions of the United States including Arizona where she exhibited at the Art Exchange in 1922.

In 1930 Loren Barton married Perez Babcock in Italy, and for the next seven years she traveled regularly between Italy and New York. In 1937 she returned to Los Angeles and later taught at the Chouinard School of Art from 1941-1947. In 1951 she married Jervis Russell Miller.

Achieving success early in her career, Loren Barton exhibited regularly from 1920-1950s. In 1933 she was commissioned by the White House to paint the first ladies' gowns. Her work can be found in the collections of the New York Public Library, the National Gallery of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the National Library of France.

Credits:

"An Encyclopedia of Women Artists of the American West" by Phil Kovinick and Marian Yoshiki-Kovinick

Peter Falk, "Who Was Who in American Art"

Courtesy of CaliforniaWatercolor.com