The Irvine Museum
18881 Von Karman Avenue, Suite 100, Irvine, California 92612
Phone (949) 476-0294 Fax (949) 476-2437

(rev. 11/07/07)
(Mr.) JEAN STERN
Executive Director, The Irvine Museum

A recognized authority on California Impressionism, Jean Stern has extensive experience in the field as an author, curator, lecturer, and teacher. He has been the executive director of the Irvine Museum since its inception in January, 1993, and has established a national presence for the Irvine Museum in the field of California Impressionism through a noteworthy international series of books, exhibitions, lectures, articles and video documentaries.

Mr. Stern is the author of numerous books and articles on California Impressionism, including monographs on important artists such Franz A. Bischoff, Alson S. Clark, Sam Hyde Harris and Elsie Palmer Payne. In 2001, he and Joan Irvine Smith researched and co-authored CALIFORNIA, THIS GOLDEN LAND of PROMISE, the highly acclaimed history of California, illustrated with hundreds of important historical paintings, published by Chapman University Press and the Irvine Museum.

He has written essays for numerous books and museum exhibition catalogues. In addition, he has been a contributor to several books on California art including PLEIN AIR PAINTERS of CALIFORNIA: The Southland; GUY ROSE: American Impressionist; ENCHANTED ISLE: A History of Painting on Santa Catalina Island; and FROM SEA TO SHINING SEA.

Mr. Stern has presented lectures on California Impressionism at the International Cultural Center, Krakow, Poland; the National Academy Museum in New York; the Terra Museum in Chicago; the Oakland Museum; the Los Angeles County Museum; the San Diego Museum; the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma; the Pasadena Historical Society; the Gibbes Museum in Charleston; the Brigham Young University Museum; the Autry National Western Heritage Center; The Nature Conservancy of California Annual Meeting (1998); the California Art Club Annual Meeting (1998 and 2006); the Bohemian Club in San Francisco; as well as many others. He appears in IMPRESSIONS OF CALIFORNIA, the 1996 PBS documentary video series on art in California and on PLEIN AIR: Painting the American Landscape, a 2007 PBS video series on American Art.

Since 1993, the Irvine Museum with Jean Stern as director, has produced a number of traveling exhibitions, including SELECTIONS FROM THE IRVINE MUSEUM (1993); REFLECTIONS OF CALIFORNIA (1994); ROMANCE OF THE BELLS, The California Missions in Art (1995); PALETTE OF LIGHT (1995); GUY ROSE, AMERICAN IMPRESSIONIST (1995-1996, a joint project with the Oakland Museum); CALIFORNIA IMPRESSIONISTS (1996, an official event at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games Cultural Olympiad); IMPRESSIONS OF CALIFORNIA (1996), accompanied by a PBS documentary series; ALL THINGS BRIGHT & BEAUTIFUL (1998), an exhibition tour that included New York and Chicago; CALIFORNIA: THIS GOLDEN LAND of PROMISE (2001); and MASTERS OF LIGHT (2002) the first international traveling exhibition of California Impressionist paintings, shown in Paris, France, Krakow, Poland, and Madrid, Spain.