Bruce Porter was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 painter, sculptor, stained-glass designer, writer, muralist, landscape design

Landscape design

Landscape design is an independent profession and a design and art tradition, practised by landscape designers, combining nature and culture. In contemporary practice landscape design bridges between landscape architecture and garden design.-Design scope:...

er and art critic

Art critic

An art critic is a person who specializes in evaluating art. Their written critiques, or reviews, are published in newspapers, magazines, books and on web sites...

.

Biography

He spent his youth in Martinez, California

Martinez, California

Martinez is a city and the county seat of Contra Costa County, California, United States. The population was 35,824 at the 2010 census. The downtown is notable for its large number of preserved old buildings...

 where his father was the editor of the local newspaper, but was later educated in San Francisco, Paris, London and Venice.

His tonalist paintings which are rare include Man and Nature (1903) and Presidio Cliffs which was exhibited at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition (1915).

Some of Porter's stained-glass designs can be found at St Mary's Episcopal Church in Pacific Grove, California

Pacific Grove, California

Pacific Grove is a coastal city in Monterey County, California, USA, with a population of 15,041 as of the 2010 census, down from 15,522 as of the 2000 census...

, Swedenborgian Church (1895) and the Le Petit Trianon mansion (1904), both in San Francisco. Windows he designed adorn churches in Monterey

Monterey, California

The City of Monterey in Monterey County is located on Monterey Bay along the Pacific coast in Central California. Monterey lies at an elevation of 26 feet above sea level. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 27,810. Monterey is of historical importance because it was the capital of...

, Stockton

Stockton, California

Stockton, California, the seat of San Joaquin County, is the fourth-largest city in the Central Valley of the U.S. state of California. With a population of 291,707 at the 2010 census, Stockton ranks as this state's 13th largest city...

, San Mateo

San Mateo, California

San Mateo is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area. With a population of approximately 100,000 , it is one of the larger suburbs on the San Francisco Peninsula, located between Burlingame to the north, Foster City to the east, Belmont to the south,...

 and Coronado

Coronado, California

Coronado, also known as Coronado Island, is an affluent resort city located in San Diego County, California, 5.2 miles from downtown San Diego. Its population was 24,697 at the 2010 census, up from 24,100 at the 2000 census. U.S. News and World Report lists Coronado as one of the most expensive...

.

As a landscape designer, Porter created the gardens at the Filoli

Filoli

Filoli is a country house set in of formal gardens surrounded by estate, located in Woodside, California, about 25 miles south of San Francisco, at the southern end of Crystal Springs Lake, on the eastern slope of the Santa Cruz Mountains....

 estate (1917) in Woodside, California

Woodside, California

Woodside is a small incorporated town in San Mateo County, California, United States, on the San Francisco Peninsula. It uses a council-manager system of government. The U.S. Census estimated the population of the town to be 5,287 in 2010....

, designed the landscaping at Memorial Stadium at the University of California at Berkeley (1923), designed the Memorial Arch (1919) on Saratoga-Los Gatos Road in Saratoga, California

Saratoga, California

Saratoga is a city in Santa Clara County, California, USA. It is located on the west side of the Santa Clara Valley, directly west of San Jose, in the San Francisco Bay area. The population was 29,926 at the 2010 census....

 and provided landscaping for several private homes.

Porter's other accomplishments included designing the Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer. His best-known books include Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde....

 monument in Portsmouth Square

Portsmouth Square

Portsmouth Square is a one-block park in Chinatown, San Francisco, California, that is bounded by Kearny Street on the east, Washington Street on the north, Clay Street on the south, and Walter Lum Place on the west....

 in San Francisco. His many murals include those at the Pacific Union Club and the First Unitarian church, also in San Francisco.

Porter also wrote art criticisms for local newspapers. For two years, 1895 to 1897, Porter, along with Gelett Burgess

Gelett Burgess

Frank Gelett Burgess was an artist, art critic, poet, author and humorist. An important figure in the San Francisco Bay Area literary renaissance of the 1890s, particularly through his iconoclastic little magazine, The Lark, he is best known as a writer of nonsense verse...

and William Doxey, published the literary magazine The Lark. Porter also contributed to Arts in California (1916), a book that compiled the art works exhibited at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition.

Further reading

• Artists in California 1786 - 1940 (1989), Edan Milton Hughes
• Dictionary of American Painters, Sculptors and Engravers (1986), Mantle Fielding
• Arts in California (1916), Bruce Porter, Porter Garnett, et al.
• San Francisco Chronicle, 26 November 1953 (obit)
• Saratoga Chamber of Commerce