Paul Alexander Bartlett papers and works of art, 1912-1993

Paul Alexander Bartlett was born in Moberly, Missouri in 1909. His parents were the Rev. Robert Alexander and Minnie Lou (Dobson) Bartlett. He graduated from Oberlin College in 1931 and attended graduate school at the U. of Arizona until 1934. A few years later, he attended the Academia San Carlos in Mexico City and the Escuela de Belles Artes, Guadalajara, Jalisco from 1940 until 1942. He married the poet and artist Elizabeth Roberta Winters in 1943. They had one son, Steven.

Paul Bartlett was an independent artist and writer for most of his career, except when he was editor of publications at the U. of California, Santa Barbara from 1965 to 1970. His artistic career was distinguished because he made the first artistic record of the haciendas of Mexico. His photographs and pen and ink illustrations were made on site from 1943 to 1985. Bartlett’s career as a writer led to the publication of many poems and short stories. He also published a novel, When the Owl Cries (Macmillan, 1960), and a novelette, Adios Mi Mexico (1983). In 1990, The Haciendas of Mexico: An Artist’s Record was published.

Paul Bartlett’s short stories, serials, and poetry appeared in many literary magazines, such as Southwest Review, Crosscurrents, Antenna, Etc, Greyledge Review, Prospice, and Queen’s Quarterly. He had showings of his hacienda art work at the Los Angeles County Museum, the New York City Public Library, the University of Virginia, the University of Texas, the Instituto Mexicano-Norteamericano (Mexico City), the Bancroft Library, and more. He received fellowships from The New School for Social Research, The Huntington Hartford Foundation, The Montalvo Association, The Dorland Colony, and The Yaddo Foundation. He died shortly after an automobile accident in 1990.