Staging California in Early Hollywood

Staging California in Early Hollywood considers how Southern California functioned as both a real environment and a cinematic invention in the early twentieth century. During the Great Depression, many plein air painters transitioned into Hollywood scenic, graphic, and backdrop work, where their deep knowledge of the local landscape enabled them to make the region a stand-in for locations around the world.

The exhibition highlights the central role of plein air painting in shaping the visual language of early filmmaking. It also foregrounds these artists’ largely uncredited artistic labor within the powerful studio system, alongside key innovations in sound and color that transformed cinema in the 1920s and 1930s.