American Landscape artist Richard Humphrey was born in Berkeley, California on December 21, 1951. The following year, he and his family moved to Los Angeles and then to Palos Verdes Estates in 1959, where he spent his childhood exploring the rural coastline of the Palos Verdes Peninsula. This early experience in nature helped form Humphrey’s passion for landscape painting and open space preservation.

Richard Humphrey attended Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles, and upon graduation he began working in the Graphic and Design Department of The Aerospace Corporation where he eventually rose to the department’s top staff artist and designer. In 1985, through the influence of high school friend and fellow artist, Daniel W. Pinkham, Humphrey began the practice of plein air painting. He gleaned inspiration from the works of Russian Impressionist Issac Levitan and numerous American Impressionists, including Childe Hassam, Emil Carlsen, Guy Rose, and Edgar Payne. Additionally, Humphrey’s landscape paintings are influenced by the Hudson River School and its teachings of the relationship between the land and its beauty as a direct expression of a divine source and creative order. Humphrey is known for his rendered impressionist style, which is unique from the traditional loose plein air painting approach.

In 1997, Richard Humphrey organized the first of several exhibitions featuring work of the newly formed Portuguese Bend Artist Colony. Fellow members included local artists Stephen Mirich, Daniel W. Pinkham, Vicki Pinkham, Kevin Prince, Amy Sidrane, and Tom Redfield. The annual exhibitions spanned from 1997 to 2009 and raised significant funds and public awareness for the recently formed Palos Verdes Peninsula Land Conservancy. The efforts resulted in a successful community support to preserve more than 1,700 acres of open space.

Humphrey’s work has been exhibited in the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles, Bowers Museum of Santa Ana, Pasadena Museum of California Art, Carnegie Art Museum, the State Capital Building of Sacramento, Autry Museum of the American West, The Irvine Museum, Hilbert Museum of California Art, Frederick R. Weisman Museum of Art, and Bennington Art Museum in Vermont. In 2007 he received the California Art Club’s Gold Medal for the Edgar Payne Award for Best Landscape at the 96th Annual Gold Medal Juried Exhibition held at the Pasadena Museum of California Art. Rick Humphrey’s paintings are in collections throughout the United States and Europe.

Professional Membership

Signature Member, California Art Club; Founding Member, The Portuguese Bend Artist Colony

Selected Publications

Newspapers, Magazines & Catalogs

“California Art Club Showcases Natural World at Autry Museum Exhibition”, Los Angeles Daily News, March 2016 by Sandra Barrera

"Natural Instincts: The Portuguese Bend Artist Colony", Terranea Summer 2011, Vol. 1 No. 1, by Fabienne Marsh

“Conserving and Preserving the Landscape, The Portuguese Bend Artist Colony”, American Artist, Spring 2011, by Naomi Ekperigin

"Natural Progression", South Bay Magazine, Sep/Oct 2009, by Marlene Stang

“Artist Profile: Richard Humphrey”, California Art Club Newsletter, Summer edition, 2008, by Molly Siple, contributing writer

"Land of Sunlight", Contemporary Paintings of San Diego County, 2007, by James Lightner, San Diego Flora publishers

”Moonlight Paintings: Capturing The Mystery of the Night”, Fine Art Connoisseur, June 2006, by Jean Stern, Art Historian and Executive Director of the Irvine Museum

“Preservation in Paint”, Palos Verdes Peninsula News, Thursday, May 15, 2003, Vol. 66 No. 39, by Josh Cohen, News Staff Writer

“John Twachtman: An American Impressionist”, California Art Club Newsletter, Spring edition, 2000, by Peter Adams, Artist and President of the California Art Club

“Plein Air Artists Endeavor to Preserve the Landscape”, Art Business News, February 1997 by Laura Meyers

“California Art Club Showcases Natural World at Autry Museum Exhibition”, Los Angeles Daily News, March 2016 by Sandra Barrera

Books
Painting California: Seascapes and Beach Towns Paintings of the California Art Club by Jean Stern & Molly Siple, Foreword by Elaine Adams, Published by Rizzoli International, 2017; California Light: A Century of Landscapes by the California Art Club by Jean Stern & Molly Siple, Published by Rizzoli International, 2011