San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI) was a private college of contemporary art in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1871, SFAI was one of the oldest art schools in the United States and the oldest west of the Mississippi River. Approximately 220 undergraduates and 112 graduate students were enrolled in 2021. The institution was accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) and the National Association of Schools of Art and Design (NASAD), and was a member of the Association of Independent Colleges of Art and Design (AICAD). The school closed permanently in July 2022.
Arthur F. Mathews was an American Tonalist painter who was one of the founders of the American Arts and Crafts Movement. Trained as an architect and artist, he and his wife Lucia Kleinhans Mathews had a significant effect on the evolution of Californian art in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His students include Granville Redmond, Xavier Martinez, Armin Hansen, Percy Gray, Gottardo Piazzoni, Ralph Stackpole, Mary Colter, Maynard Dixon, Rinaldo Cuneo and Francis McComas.
Joseph Dwight Strong, Jr. (1853–1899) was an American artist and illustrator, known for his paintings. He was active between 1870s until 1899, in the San Francisco Bay Area, Monterey, Kingdom of Hawaii, and Samoa.
Theodore Wores was an American painter born in San Francisco, son of Joseph Wores and Gertrude Liebke. His father worked as a hat manufacturer in San Francisco.
Thelma Beatrice Johnson Streat (1912–1959) was an African-American artist, dancer, and educator. She gained prominence in the 1940s for her art, performance and work to foster intercultural understanding and appreciation.
The San Francisco Art Association (SFAA) was an organization that promoted California artists, held art exhibitions, published a periodical, and established the first art school west of Chicago. The SFAA – which, by 1961, completed a long sequence of mission shifts and re-namings to become the San Francisco Art Institute – was the predecessor of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Over its lifetime, the association helped establish a Northern California regional flavor of California Tonalism as differentiated from Southern California American Impressionism.
Alice Brown Chittenden was an American painter based in San Francisco, California who specialized in flowers, portraits, and landscapes. Her life's work was a collection of botanicals depicting California wildflowers, for which she is renowned and received gold and silver medals at expositions. She taught at the Mark Hopkins Institute of Art from 1897 to 1941.
Mary DeNeale Morgan also known as M. DeNeale Morgan, was an American plein air painter, especially in watercolor, and printmaker. She was the director the Carmel Summer School of Art sponsored by the Carmel Arts and Crafts Club and a founding member of the Carmel Art Association (CAA) in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California.
Matilda Lotz (1858–1923) was an American painter. She was one of California's premiere female artists, as well as a prominent animal portraitist. Lotz was born and raised in the Lotz House, which became the site of an American Civil War Battle, and is now on the National Register of Historic Places.
Dorothy Rieber Joralemon was an American abstract sculptor, children's portrait artist and writer based in Northern California.
Giuseppe Leone Cadenasso was an Italian-born American oil painter who lived in San Francisco, California, where he was a member of the Bohemian Club.
Charles Rollo Peters was an American oil painter of nocturnes.
John Aloysius Stanton was an American landscape and religious painter. He was a professor and the dean of faculty of the San Francisco Art Institute.
Juan B. Wandesforde was an American painter. In 1872, he co-founded the San Francisco Art Association with Virgil Macey Williams. His work can be seen at the Laguna Art Museum.
John Marshall Gamble was an American painter who focused on California landscapes and wildflowers. He relocated to Santa Barbara after his San Francisco studio was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake. He was an influential in the Santa Barbara art scene, being a teacher and School Board President of the Santa Barbara School of the Arts.
Harry Stuart Fonda was an American painter, musician, and professor, best known for his marine and landscape paintings.
Elizabeth Strong (1855–1941) was an American artist, known for landscape, animal and figure paintings. She was nicknamed, "the Rosa Bonheur of America".
Sylvia Lark (1947–1990) was a Native American/Seneca artist, curator, and educator. She best known as an Abstract expressionist painter and printmaker. Lark lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for many years.
