Donna N. Schuster

In 1914 she was a student at the William Merritt Chase Summer School of Art in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California. Despite the brutal murder of her fellow student Helena Wood Smith, she returned to Carmel in 1916 and sent her paintings to the Woman’s Exhibition at the Oakland Art Gallery.

In 1923, Schuster built a studio-home in the hills of Griffith Park and joined the faculty of Otis Art Institute. She also had a second home and studio in Laguna Beach where she spent her summers.

She returned as an exhibitor to the Oakland Art Gallery in 1924 when Director William Clapp organized a show of regional “Impressionists,” which was so successful that it was sent to the Los Angeles Museum.[1] Schuster expanded her horizons when she was able to join a painting tour through Belgium. She co-founded the California Art Club and Women Painters of the West [2]

She was a member of the Group of Eight, who considered themselves modernist in their use of rich color, expressive techniques, and an emphasis on the figure. She also was a great admirer of Claude Monet and, in fact, built a lily pond in her backyard that she used for a series of lily pond studies, not unlike those of Monet. Toward the end of the 1920s Schuster studied with modernist artist Stanton Macdonald-Wright (1890-1973), leading her to experiment with Cubism and later, Abstract Expressionism.[3]

Her art was exhibited at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1914, 1917, 1920, 1927 and 1929. Later, in the 1930s, she had shows at the San Francisco Art Association, the New York Academy of Fine Art and the New York Watercolor Society. She was a founding member of the California Watercolor Society and was involved with their exhibitions from 1921 until the mid 1940s.

In 1953, Schuster died, trapped inside her home as it was destroyed in a brush-fire.[4]