Victor De Wilde Biography

Victor De Wilde

American

1903-1977

Biography

Victor De Wilde, painter and printmaker, was born in Tamines, Belgium on April 4, 1903. He emigrated to San Francisco in 1925 where he studied at the California School of Fine Arts, as well as the California College of Arts & Crafts (now the California College of the Arts, CCA) in Oakland, California. He became an instructor at Commerce Evening High School while working for the WPA's Art Education division during the Depression, and later taught at the CCA.

He was an exhibiting member of the San Francisco Art Association, California Watercolor Society, and the California Society of Etchers. He also exhibited at the Oakland Art Gallery from 1936-1940, the New York World's Fair in 1939, the Golden Gate International Exhibition in 1939, and the California Sate Fair in 1940. In 1949 he was a featured artist in a show at the San Francisco Museum of Art along with Harry O. Baker and Karl Baumann.

Victor De Wilde eventually relocated with his family to Guerneville, Sonoma County, California, an hour's drive north of San Francisco. He died there on August 28, 1977. His work is included in the permanent collection of the National Gallery of Art and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.