[From the catalogue-in-progress for “Landscapes & Livestock”, a loan exhibition for Agincourt Homecoming in the Fall of 2015]

TOMLIN, Trudence [1919–?]

“Golden Gate”

1939/1940

oil on canvas / 17.5 inches by 13.5 inches

During the 1930s Karl Wasserman consulted Dr Reinhold Kölb, proprietor of the Walden Clinic, on the subject of psychotherapy. Kölb was known to use art therapy with his “clients” as Wasserman introduced symbolic abstraction into his art classes at Northwest Iowa Normal. Student Trudence Tomlin painted “Golden Gate” as a sophomore at the college. She did not graduate, however—perhaps due to financial matters during the Depression—and has only a sketchy alumnae record. It is fortunate for us that this work was chosen from the student exhibit in the Spring of 1940, probably chosen by Wasserman himself.

[#694]