Roy Martell Mason(1886-1972) (Batavia, NY / La Jolla, Ca.)

Artist visitor to Morro Bay 1959.

“Recent distinguished visitors in Morro Bay were Mr. and Mrs. Roy Martell Mason from Batavia, N. Y. Mason, a landscape painter and a member of the National Academy, was impressed by the scenic potentialities of the community, and canvassed the town in an effort to locate a totally new vantage point from which to paint the distinctive local landmark, Morro Rock.

Born in Gilbert Mills, N. Y., March 15, 1886, Mason was educated there in the public schools. Meanwhile he had undertaken the study of art under his father’s instruction. Since 1929 he has been the recipient of numerous awards including the Gold Medal of Honor for watercolor of the Allied Artists of America show of 1952-53. He is presently represented in the Metropolitan Museum of New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, and 15 other museums throughout the country, and more than 100 private collections. In partnership with his brother, he served as art director for 35 years with F. E. Mason and Sons, engravers, in Batavia. In 1930 he became an Associate of the National Academy, and in 1940 was elected to full membership as National Academician. He is a life member and 1953 vice president of the American Water Color Society, Philadelphia Water Color Society, Rochester Art Club and other organizations and an art contributor to the covers of Readers Digest, Colliers, and other periodicals.

Questioned as to his position with regard to conservative versus advanced theories of art, Mason stated his sympathy is entirely with conservative art that he does not pretend to understand the surrealists, the post-Impressionists, and least of all the abstract expressionists. ‘The dot-dash and the paint-pourers’ to him are ‘suspect in their motivation and questionable in their achievement.’

Mr. and Mrs. Mason were returning from a weekend trip in Carmel where they were guests of the internationally celebrated naturalist, Roy Chapman Andrews and his wife. Stopping in Morro Bay en route to their new home in La Jolla, which they purchased in the last two months as their permanent residence, Mason found material in great abundance in this central coast area. He said Morro Bay was literally a ‘pictorial gold mine,’ that he could work here and in the vicinity for months.

The artist has held a membership with the Audubon Artists, and both he and Mrs. Mason are former members of the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology at Ithaca. Mrs. Mason devoted time during their visit here to observation of shore birds and other water fowl in the bay. Both Mr. and Mrs. Mason expressed genuine interest and liking for Morro Bay and San Luis Obispo County. They said they hoped the area will continue to remain relatively unspoiled for both residents and artists. They look forward to future visits that will be pleasant and artistically productive.” per Nadine Richards, “Visit to Morro Bay Impresses Landscape Painter,” and port. at easel, Sun, Dec. 11, 1959, sec. 2, p. 3.

Source: Nancy Dustin Wall Moure, MORRO BAY (including LOS OSOS, BAYWOOD PARK and CAYUCOS) ART AND PHOTOGRAPHY BEFORE 1960 (Publications in [Southern] California Art, vol. 13, no. I), Los Angeles: Dustin Publications, 2016.

Born in Gilbert Mills, New York, Roy Martell Mason painted a wide range of outdoor subject matter reflecting his interest in hunting and fishing. He won many awards including the Gold Medal from the American Watercolor Society. He was also an illustrator, whose work appeared in Reader's Digest and True magazines.

Mason was raised on a farm and was encouraged in his art talent by his father who worked as an engraver and who also taught his son the skills and love of outdoor sports.

His art education consisted of only one correspondence course, which he later referred to as his "formal art training." He worked with his father in an engraving business, and then became head of the art department for a Philadelphia lithograph company while maintaining his own studio for painting.

A close friend of artist Chauncey Ryder from 1926, Mason often painted with him in New Hampshire.

He became a member of the Buffalo Society of Artists, the Salmagundi Club, the American Federation of Arts, the Philadelphia Water Color Club, Grand Central Galleries and an Associate Member of the National Academy of Design.

In 1959, he and his wife, Lena, moved to LaJolla, California, where they lived the remainder of their years.


Sources include:
Peter Falk, Who Was Who in American Art

Born in Gilbert Mills, NY on March 15, 1886, Roy Martell Mason was primarily self-taught, but received criticism from Chauncey Ryder. As well as hunting and fishing scenes, he also did illustrations for magazines including Collier's, True, and Reader's Digest.

While maintaining a studio in Batavia, New York, he began spending long periods in southern California in the 1930s and later lived there until his death in La Jolla on Aug. 13, 1972.

Memberships:
National Academy; Salmagundi Club; American Watercolor Society.

Exhibitions:
National Academy of Design, 1930; Salmagundi Club, 1930, 1931 (awards); Art Institute of Chicago, 1941; American WaterColor Society, 1956 (gold medal); Laguna Beach Art Association, 1960-61; Los Angeles County Fair, 1961.

Collections:
Art Institute of Chicago; Illinois State Museum; Haggin Museum (Stockton); MM; Toledo Museum.

The following comes from Kirk Arnold:

My great aunt, Edith Gregg, was a school teacher in Pennelville, New York from the late 1800's through the early 1950's. During that time Roy Mason and Edith became good friends. Roy would often come to paint in the "ballroom" of her family's hotel. He commented that the lighting in the room was just perfect for painting. Roy often gave Aunt Eddie a painting as a Christmas present. One interesting painting Men Mending Nets is also in the Roy Mason exhibit in Batavia, but from a different angle.

Roy kept in contact with Aunt Eddie through the remainder of her life and also with my mom after they moved to California.

The following, submitted September 2005, is from Blue Harris, who has the information on the back of paintings he owns by the artist:

"This fine water color is from the brush of Roy Mason, a National Academician since 1940. Who's Who in America rates him as tops in his field and the most recent in a long list of awards for his work won the Gold Medal of Honor, given to him by the Audubon Artists in 1945."

Born 1886 in Gilbert Mills, New York and dying 1972 in La Jolla, California, Roy Mason had firsthand knowledge of wildfowl, shooting and fishing for sport provided themes for the vast majority of his paintings. His use of the medium of watercolor enabled him to create landscape and wildlife paintings that reached a large audience outside of the sporting community.

The exposure to outdoor life and art were instilled in Roy Mason by his father, Frank E. Mason. The elder Mason was a farmer-turned-engraver, who trained his son in the use of rod and gun on frequent outings in New York state and Canada. He also instructed both Roy and his older sister Nina in the techniques of drawing.

A correspondence course from New York was the only formal training for Roy Mason, an artist who won the gold Medal of Honor of the America Watercolor Society in 1961.

When Frank Mason established a label manufacturing company in the family's hometown of Batavia, New York, Roy Mason went to work making the drawings for his father's engravings. But the younger Mason also painted in watercolor. He entered the Strathmore Watercolor Paper Contest and won third prize, a trip to Puerto Rico. After painting on that island, he resolved to pursue a career as a painter.

Roy Mason worked in Philadelphia until 1919, when he returned to Batavia to head the art department of his father's firm. In 1959 he retired and moved to California.

He began to exhibit his paintings with local and national art associations and to produce art work for nationally distributed periodicals. In 1940 he was elected to full membership in the National Academy of Design. During this artist's lifetime, his watercolors were featured in one-man shows in galleries and museums across the United States.