Tarbox Beals, Jessie (1870-1942) Archive of Signed Photographs, circa 1930.
Fifteen gelatin silver prints of which twelve are signed and stamped, two stamped, and one identified in another hand; mostly taken in Santa Barbara and Hollywood, California, including a short series of Santa Barbara gardens, some images of stately homes and landmarks, and five examples of her signature photos taken at night, all matted; [together with] two loose 8 x 10 in. images of an unidentified art gallery, signed; an unsigned duplicate image of the Lobero Theatre; a small (4 3/4 x 2 1/2 in.) silver print of the Woolworth Tower on a signed mount, 8 1/2 x 4 3/4 in. overall; [and] two large film negatives of two other images.
"[In 1928, Beals's] economic prospects in New York declining, [she] decided to move to California. There she imagined a more stable income and prosperous lifestyle photographing wealthy people and their gardens, as many people she knew from earlier years in Greenwich Village had moved to artist colonies in southern California or were working in Hollywood. [...] In California, Beals lived and worked first in Santa Barbara, and then in Hollywood, which she found more engaging. Again, her photos of estates and gardens were popular with magazine publishers. Unfortunately, the stock market crash of 1929 cost Beals most of her business." (cf. the New York Historical Society Museum & Library's finding aid for its Jessie Tarbox Beals holdings: https://dlib.nyu.edu/findingaids/html/nyhs/beals/bioghist.html)
