Linford Donovan
American, 1906-2003

Joined Carmel Art Association 1952.

Linford Donovan’s art studies began at age 10, with Ella Shepard Bush, portrait painter and minaturist and continued at USC and UCLA (BFA) and UC Berkeley (MA), which included a year of research in Mexico City. She also studied privately with Raphael Montalboddi, a well-known Italian painter, and much later with a master Japanese screen-maker in Tokyo.

She worked with Edith Head in the Costume Design Department of Paramount Studios, taught Fashion Design at Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, NY; and art classes at various Southern California junior colleges. Moving to the Monterey Peninsula, she devoted herself full-time to painting, initially as a portrait painter. She traveled extensively in Europe, Asia and the Near East for inspiration and research.

Her numerous portrait commissions have included Toyonobu Domen (late President of Agi-no-moto Co. Japan) and his wife; Charlton Heston as Moses for the movie “The Ten Commandments”; and Anita Doud for the Monterey History and Art Association. She has illustrated children’s books and had two books published by Walter Foster, How Linford Donovan Paints Hands and Folk Art of Mexico. She is listed in Who’s Who in American Women.