Back to the Artist Page

Charlotte E. Morgan Biography
Morgan did studies of mining subjects at Sutter’s Creek, as well as in Amador County. Although she also painted scenes in Sonoma County and in and around San Francisco, it was Carmel and its environs which became her favorite sketching area and remained so during the last decades of her life.

Born in Lakeville, CA on Jan. 29, 1867. Charlotte Bodwell began her art studies in San Francisco at the School of Design under Arthur F. Mathews, Amedee Joullin, and Emil Carlsen (1886-90) and received an honorable mention in drawing in 1889. She was also a student of Oscar Kunath and Lorenzo P. Latimer and later studied with Armin Hansen in Carmel. In addition, she attended the University of California, Berkeley (1916-1919), earning a BA degree in art, with honors in drawing and art, and nine years later, she earned an MA degree in graphic art at UC Berkeley (1928) where she was a pupil of Perham Nahl.

About 1896 Morgan married Ross Morgan, a civil engineer and brother of Carmel artist Mary DeNeale Morgan, her classmate at the School of Design. They lived in the Mother Lode country for a few years before establishing a home in Berkeley. After her husband's death in 1917, she taught in the public schools before settling on the Monterey Peninsula in 1923. Maintaining a studio in Carmel, she and her sister-in-law, Mary DeNeale Morgan, were involved in the village's early art activity which included teaching and exhibiting with the Carmel Arts & Crafts Club and the local art association.

Early California history is often the subject of her paintings. Mrs. Morgan was a resident of Carmel until her death on March 29, 1947.

Exhibited: Calif. State Fair, 1887, 1894, 1896; Mechanics' Inst. (SF), 1893; Berkeley AA, 1908; SFAA, 1920; Carmel Arts & Crafts Club, 1920; Carmel AA, 1927; Calif. Statewide (Santa Cruz), 1931; Oakland Art Gallery, 1932.

In: Harrison Library (Carmel); CHS.

Source:
Edan Hughes, "Artists in California, 1786-1940"; California State Library (Sacramento); American Art Annual 1931-33; Who's Who in American Art 1938-53; Artists of the American West (Doris Dawdy); Women Artists of the American West (Kovinick); Death record; Carmel Pine Cone, 3-31-1947 (obituary).