- Hello and welcome to arteffects.

I'm Beth Macmillan, 2021 marks the ninetieth anniversary of the Nevada museum of art to help commemorate the occasion.

The museum curated a special exhibit dedicated to Latimer art club.

Throughout the art clubs.

One-hundred years, its members have captured breathtaking scenery of Northern Nevada and surrounding regions, including fallen leaf lake.

(piano music) - [Ann] The Nevada museum of art is located in downtown Reno Nevada, and we are the only accredited art museum in the state of Nevada.

The Nevada museum of art turns ninety years old this year.

And so we thought it was a great opportunity to look back at the founding history of the Nevada museum of art.

This is an exhibition as well as a book that brings together the work, not only of Lorenzo Latimer, who was an important artist in the early nineteen hundreds in our region, but also the group of women, artists that formed around him to establish what we know as the Latimer art club.

(piano music) - Lorenzo Latimer was a California water colorist.

He had a studio in San Francisco, which was destroyed in the San Francisco earthquake and fire in 1906.

- [Ann] Lorenzo Latimer lost his entire studio.

All of his paintings, many artists from the San Francisco bay area.

They sought solace in the Sierra and Lorenzo Latimer was one of those artists.

That's what led him to venture further afield to the lake Tahoe region.

And that's when he discovered fallen leaf lake.

(piano music) - [Jack] Falling leaf lake is about a mile from the south end of lake Tahoe from Reno.

It's about a 40 minute drive or so to get up there, Lorenzo Latimer, he was always looking for new places to paint places that had not been painted widely.

So when you discovered fallen leaf lake, he had really discovered a gem that had not been painted that much.

He had a cabin right on the water.

He would teach classes.

People would come up from the bay area.

- [Ann] He hosted groups of students every summer at the lake where they would come together and paint outdoors, not just at the lake shore, but higher up on the Tamarack trail.

And sometimes even into desolation valley.

(Piano music) - [Eileen] Mr. Latimer taught people to go out in nature and to seek beautiful scenes to paint.

And we have so many in Nevada, whether it's the mountains or the river or lakes.

- A couple of years after Lorenzo Latimer began teaching workshops at fallen leaf lake.

There were two women from Reno, Nevada Wilson, and Dora Groesbeck who enrolled in one of his classes.

They loved his teaching style and they invited him to Northern Nevada for a visit.

And a couple of years later in 1921, that group established itself as the Latimer art club.

(Piano music) - I joined the Latimer art club in 2004.

(Guitar music) The membership has more than tripled since I joined.

So we're over 80 members of the club.

- I started working with the Nevada museum of art with Anna Wolfe, about 2018.

She approached me about doing this exhibition and it was a perfect thing to do.

- [Ann] Jack Bacon has been working in our community as an art specialist for many, many years.

So it really was just a great coming together of resources to put together this exhibition.

the exhibition consists of hundreds of paintings, not only by Lorenzo Latimer, but also by the founding members of the Latimer art club.

And we've also brought together an amazing array of objects, you know, Lorenzo Latimer's palette, notes and cards that he sent to his students, amazing mementos of the very first Latimer art club pin.

So this is very much a comprehensive exhibition that looks at the history of the Latimer art club and the Nevada museum of art.

(guitar music) - [Eileen] What I think is amazing is that so many pieces of art from the students and from Latimer were found in our community.

- I think one of my favorite parts is the Redwood wall with all of the Redwood paintings.

It's a combination of paintings by a not only Latimer, but several of his students.

- I got a real kick out of seeing the photos of the gals in the twenties and thirties and how they dressed up to go out painting and what their outfits were like.

- I'm also particularly pleased with the number of handwritten letters and other ephemera that we have in the display cases, where we were able to assemble some very rare things that help tell the story.

(Upbeat music) - [Ann] It was the visionary university of Nevada professor, Dr. James Church, who wanted to establish an art gallery in Northern Nevada.

He invited the Latimer art club to join him.

And a lot of our art club becomes the first volunteer arm of the Nevada art gallery.

After a few years, the Nevada art gallery becomes the Nevada museum of art.

- [Eileen] These women help to also form the Sierra watercolor society, the Nevada artists association, Sierra arts.

And so they were real involved, not only in the arts, but in other cultural areas in the community.

- It's really heartening to know that Lorenzo Latimer's legacy lives on in our community.

The Latimer art club is still a very active community organization.

You can see members of the Latimer art club painting down by the Truckee river in Virginia city up near Mount rose.

We're just really proud to have them as a part of our community.

(upbeat music) - [Presenter] Funding for artifacts is made possible by Sandy Raffealli The June S Wisham Estate, Carol Franc Buck Merrill and Lebo Newman, Heidemarie Rochlin, Meg and Dillard Myers, The annual contributions of PBS Reno members.

And by (Cheerful music)