Recently we visited a Monterey County, California, gallery to view paintings by Monterey Peninsula artists from John Steinbeck’s era. There we saw examples of once-forgotten fine art America is enjoying all over again, thanks to area experts like the gallery’s energetic owner, a former Monterey County Herald reporter who is also a gifted playwright. Upstairs the Monterey Peninsula artist and art restorer Shelley Cost (shown here) was beginning the painstaking process of removing sun-crusted varnish from a 1930s painting by Armin Hansen, a friend of John Steinbeck whose work is back in fashion. The images below show Shelley beginning her task, freshening a neglected specimen of older California fine art America can now enjoy in its original glory. The result? A rich piece of Monterey County’s cultural past that John Steinbeck would have seen just as Shelley restored it—the kind of ageless fine art America is learning to love, like the fiction of John Steinbeck, all over again.
Title photos courtesy Shelley Cost
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