Biography from Arlington Gallery:
| Carl Oscar Borg, protégé of Phoebe Hearst, friend of personalities like Edward Borein, Thomas Moran and Charles M. Russell, could create any subject in any medium, and do it well. He was most successful and highly regarded during his lifetime, receiving numerous awards and medals.
In the annals of American art history, Carl Oscar Borg belongs to the group of artists including Joseph Sharp, E. Martin Hennings, Walter Ufer, Victor Higgins, and Oscar Berninghaus. Borg belongs also to the group of American artists who came to California at the turn of the century to record the California landscape---artists like Marion and Elmer Wachtel, Hanson Puthuff, and William Wendt who taught him painting techniques. Borg’s works are included in many major museum, university, and private collection throughout the United States.
Borg succeeded in preserving America’s cultural heritage by documenting the customs and religious ceremonies of the Native Americans that had been shared with him. He felt a kinship with the West and the people who introduced him to it. He used paint, canvas and brushes to express the unique qualities he found in New Mexico, Arizona and California. He captured the grandeur of this unusual scenery, which is emphasized by atmosphere, light, color and expanse.
Carl Oscar Borg was born into a poor family in Dals-Grinstad, Sweden on March 3, 1879. As soon as he could hold a pencil he started copying pictures from books. He had neither the vocabulary nor the concepts to articulate a philosophy, but he yearned to be a great artist. Borg apprenticed to a house painter at age 15, then moved to London and became assistant to portrait and marine painter George Johansen. He began painting during that time.
In 1901, he sailed for the U.S. and worked as a house and furniture painter in the East. It was not the life he had dreamt about, and at the urging of his friends he headed for California. Carl Oscar Borg discovered Santa Barbara in 1903 as he made his way from San Francisco to Los Angeles. California provided the opportunity, support, and the spiritual environments, which permitted his talents to unfold, and his genius to develop. He enjoyed sailing out to the Channel Islands and often camped out weeks at the time to paint.
Under the patronage of Phoebe Hearst, who recognized Borg’s talent, he was able to return to Europe to study art. It was also Mrs. Hearst who made arrangements with the Department of the Interior for Borg to live with the Native Americans. Borg wrote: "The inhabitants of these great solitudes, these limitless horizons, this wilderness of color and form, are marked by an Arcadian simplicity, by a dignity and reserve that I am sure would be hard to find among any other living peoples…" And every summer, while residing in California, Borg would return to the desert to spend time with his many intimate friends among the Indians.
He taught art at the California Art Institute in Los Angeles, and at the Santa Barbara School of the Arts. He was the first art director for major Hollywood studios and worked with Sam Goldwyn, Douglas Fairbanks and Cecil B. DeMille.
For twenty years Borg made his way as an artist in the West, but the West began to resemble the rest of America. Carl Oscar Borg did not like the changes. But the automobile, railroad and the movies did support him as an artist. The Santa Fe Railroad hung his paintings along with other prominent artist’s work in their offices to attract the interest and attention of the tourists. Touring Topics, the AAA’s publication, featured one of Borg’s Grand Canyon paintings on the cover. Borg had a special place in his heart for the Grand Canyon. He wished to have his ashes be given to the wind of the Canyon.
But times were changing. Many of his friends in California had died. Borg saw the growing popularity of modern art. It was clear that these artists were fighting a losing battle. Borg returned to Sweden in 1934 and again in 1938. He painted people and scenes of Sweden, and successfully exhibited his paintings of the American Southwest. Although he was an American citizen, he could not return to the United States until after the war. Borg was very homesick for California, and could not wait to get back. He wrote to his friend Edwin Gledhill that he could not spend another winter in Sweden.
He returned to Santa Barbara in September of 1945. Many of his friends had died, and he was estranged from the world that had evolved there. But he was at peace with himself. On May 8, 1947, Borg was painting in his studio, as he did every day. That evening, he walked to his favorite restaurant to enjoy his favorite food. He was stricken with a massive heart attack and died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. As he requested, his ashes were given to the wind of the Grand Canyon.
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Biography from Thomas Nygard Gallery:
| CARL OSCAR BORG, ANA (1879-1947)
Born and raised in Sweden, Borg emigrated to the United States in 1902
and settled in California. Employed as a scene painter for the movie
industry, he had his first exhibition in 1905 and was immediately
recognized for his talent. Fellow artists introduced him to the West as
a subject and he began traveling and sketching throughout California
and the Southwest. His reputation earned him the interest of
William Randolph Hearst's mother who sponsored him for five years of
study in Europe where he received awards in France in 1913 and 1914.
Upon his return to the United States, Borg won the Panama-Pacific
International Exposition in 1915. He lived in Santa Barbara from 1914
to 1930 and became a very good friend of Edward Borein's. The two
traveled throughout the West painting Indian ceremonials and cowboy
genre subjects, teaching art classes as they went. Borg also painted in
Central and South America, Spain, Morocco, the Valley of the Nile, and
Italy.
In 1936 Borg, Millard Sheets, and Dr. Eugene Bolton of the University
of California wrote and illustrated a book on the history of California
titled Cross, Sword, and Gold Pan. Borg also published a book of etchings titled The Great South West that same year. His own biography was published in Sweden.
His works are held by the University of California, Los Angeles County
Museum of Art, Hearst Free Library, Montclair Art Museum, Seattle Art
Museum, the Library of Congress, Goteborg Museum in Sweden and the
Bibliotheque in Paris.
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Biography from Altermann Galleries and Auctioneers, Santa Fe I:
| Carl Oscar Borg was twenty years old when he left his native Sweden for
England. He worked in London as a scenery painter for several
years before immigrating to America in 1902. Two years later he
moved to California, where he would live for the rest of his
life. He was initially employed as a scene painter for the newly
established motion picture industry, an experience that surely
influenced his outlook on western themes.
In 1905, he traveled throughout California and the Southwest, sketching
and making notes and had his first one-man exhibition as a fine
artist. Soon after that, Borg traveled to Paris for further study,
where he advanced rapidly as a painter, gaining notoriety at home as a
prizewinner in the Panama-Pacific Exposition in 1915.
By this time, Borg had relocated to Santa Barbara and become close
friends with Edward Borein. The two painters shared the same
enthusiasm for the West, and Borg developed a local reputation as a
teacher of merit. He traveled widely, painting and sketching
where he went, and specializing in the scenery and subjects of the
Southwest. He also became an able printmaker, publishing an excellent
collection in 1936 titled The Great Southwest: Etchings, which concentrated on Navajo and Hopi themes.
Source:
The American West: Legendary Artists of the Frontier, Dr. Rick Stewart, Hawthorne Publishing Company, 1986
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Biography from William A. Karges Fine Art - Beverly Hills:
| Carl Oscar Borg was born in Sweden, and apprenticed to the English artist George Johansen at the age of 15. Working as a seaman, Borg jumped ship in San Francisco in 1901. Without funds, he walked the railway, some 450 miles, to Los Angeles, ultimately meeting William Wendt, who would teach him painting techniques.
Having shown great promise, Borg was sponsored by Phoebe Hearst to study in Paris, and Rome. It was Mrs. Hearst who encouraged Borg to paint Native American subjects, a theme for which the artist is most remembered. Borg also taught in art schools in Los Angeles and Santa Barbara, where he died in 1947. |
Biography from AskART:
| Known for Southwest Indian portraits in various mediums including oil,
watercolor, etchings, and woodblock, Carl Oscar Borg was born in
Dais-Grinstad, Sweden.
His family was poor, and he was largely
self-taught. He showed early art talent, and as a child copied
pictures from books. At age 15, he apprenticed to a house
painter, and at age 20, moved to London and assisted portrait and
marine artist George Johansen.
In 1901, he arrived in San Francisco from Sweden, having jumped ship as
a seaman on the "S.S. Arizonan. " He walked the rail track to Los
Angeles, and learned painting techniques from William Wendt, well-known
landscape artist.
Sponsored by Phoebe Hearst, mother of
newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst, Borg studied art in Paris and
Rome, and with Hearst's encouragement, also painted Indian
portraits. He then taught at the California Art Institute in Los
Angeles, spent six months in Honduras, and from 1918-24, was an
instructor at the School of Arts in Santa Barbara.
From
1924-1935, he was in California and Arizona doing commissioned
paintings of Southwest Indian tribal ceremonies for Hearst and also did
Grand Canyon landscapes. He traveled in the country when war broke out
and was forced to spend World War II in Sweden where his desert and
Indian portraits became much sought after.
After the war, he returned to Santa Barbara and died there on May 8, 1947.
One of his paintings of the Grand Canyon is in the collection of Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, from Arizona.
Sources:
Edan Hughes, Artists in California, 1786-1940
James Ballinger, Visitors to Arizona, 1846-1980 |
| ** If you discover credit omissions or have additional information to add, please let us know at registrar@AskART.com. |
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Carl Borg is also mentioned in these AskART essays:
The California Art Club
Painters of Grand Canyon
San Francisco Panama-Pacific Exhibition 1915
California Painters
Western Painters
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