Side by Side: Mathias Alten and Norman Chamberlain May 29, 2010

Norman Stiles Chamberlain was a native Grand Rapids artist whose first artistic training was provided by west Michigan's most famous impressionist painter, Mathias J. Alten. Beginning in 1910 and continuing in the 1920s and 1930s, the two artists spent weeks or months working alongside each other in The Netherlands, New Mexico, and southern California. 'Side By Side: Mathias Alten and Norman Chamberlain' is the first time these two artists have been shown together in a two-person exhibition. The paintings shown in this small and selective exhibition, shown in pairs, provide the opportunity to compare the artists' styles and techniques, and to see Alten's influence on American regional art of the early twentieth century.