Grace Libby Vollmer

Grace Libby Vollmer (1884-1977)

Born in Hopkinton, Mass. on Sept. 12, 1884. Grace Libby showed an interest in art at an early age (a pencil sketch dated 1889 is extant). After attending private schools in her native state, she joined her parents in Clarkston, ID and in 1906 married Ralston Vollmer, a member of one of Idaho’s wealthiest families. In the early 1920s the Vollmers moved to southern California. She then studied at the Otis Art Institute under Roscoe Shrader and Edward Vysekal. Traveling to Europe, she was a pupil of Hans Hofmann in Munich and continued with him in Berkeley upon returning to California in 1930. From Berkeley, the Vollmers moved to Laguna Beach where she became active in the art colony and studied under Edgar Payne and Anna Hills. Her final move in 1939 was up the coast to Santa Barbara into a large home on Middle Road in Montecito. After the death of her husband and both children in the 1940s, she continued painting until 1970 and lived there until her death on Nov. 24, 1977. Her oeuvre includes still-lifes, figures, portraits, and landscapes. Exhibited: Orange County Fair, 1927; Calif. Art Club, 1928; Painters & Sculptors of LA, 1928, 1934; Laguna Beach AA, 1935, 1936 (1st prize); Santa Barbara Museum, 1952 (solo). In: Gardena (CA) High School Collections