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Jack Wisby

Paintings in Inventory

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Artist's Biography

John G. Cloudman was born in Newburyport, Massachusetts.  In 1848 he went to France to study English-born Jack Wisby moved to San Francisco in 1897 at age of twenty-seven and was employed as an engraver at Shreve and Company while launching into a career as an easel painter. After the earthquake of 1906, Wisby moved to Marin County and lived in Bolinas and then in Inverness. A majority of Wisby paintings depict scenes in Marin County, giving us a glimpse of how it looked when it was open ranchland punctuated by a few tiny villages. In 1908, Lucy Jerome, the San Francisco Call’s art critic, noted Wisby’s attraction to the “finer, more delicate aspects of nature” and praised his ability to paint “tranquility, peace, charm and understanding” into his work. (November 8, 1908). Our painting depicts a view looking south over Lake Lagunitas towards the peak of Mount Tamalpais. Lake Lagunitas was the earliest reservoir in Marin County, created by William Coleman in 1873 as a source of water for his planned development at San Rafael. Then as now, a fire road circles the lake, seen on the far shore of Wisby’s painting.