Twentynine Palms Historical Society
29 Palms, California

Mildred Bryant Brooks

Mildred Bryant was born in Missouri but grew up in Long Beach, California. Following high school, she studied art at USC, later taking classes at Otis and Chouinart Art Schools. It was F. Tolles Chamberlin who encouraged her to become an etcher. After her marriage to Don Brooks in 1924, she taught at the Stickney Art School in Pasadena. It was in the 1930s that she was most prolific with her etchings of trees and California landscapes. Arthur Miller, artist and art critic for the Los Angeles Times, wrote that she created "America's best etchings of trees."

In 1936 Mildred Bryant Brooks had a one person show at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. During World War II, she was unable to continue in this genre as her etching supplies came from Europe. After the war she continued teaching and lecturing but by then her eyesight had weakened, so she took to painting murals and even branched out into interior decorating. In addition to twenty-two national and international awards, Mildred Bryant Brooks received the Pasadena Arts Council Gold Crown Artist Award in 1976. She died in Santa Barbara in 1995.

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