Aries IV — Ram in a Thicket is an etching created in 1978 by American artist Elizabeth Quandt. The artist included this image in her portfolio of etchings entitled “Aries.” The portfolio consisted of four etchings, all images of a ram’s skull. The “Aries” portfolio was printed in an edition of 25, numbered from 1 to 25. There were also 25 impressions issued as single prints, editioned from 26 to 50, such as this etching which is pencil signed, dated, titled and editioned 28/50. It was printed by the artist on ivory wove Arches paper and the platemark measures 5 x 5-1/4 inches. The skull had been discovered by her grandson while they were hiking in the Mendocino County countryside. The horns of the ram had gotten wedged in a small tree and the ram was unable to free itself.
Elizabeth Quandt, painter, printmaker, draughtsman, and teacher, was born Elizabeth Whinny Gunn to Sir Herbert James and Gwendoline Thorne Gunn in Oxfordshire, England on July 13, 1922. Her father was a court painter to the royal family. Elizabeth studied at and earned her certificate from Queen Anne’s School in Reading, England.
During the Second World War, Elizabeth met American Navy lieutenant William Mailliard, member of the prominent Mailliard family of San Francisco, and they married in London in 1941. The following year Elizabeth moved to San Francisco while Mailliard continued serving in the war (Mailiard would go on to become a California State Congressman). Settling into her new life, Elizabeth enrolled at the San Francisco Art Institute where she studied printmaking between 1942 and 1944. One of her etchings from this time was included in a 1944 exhibition at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.
After divorcing Mailliard in the early 1950s, Elizabeth married photographer Frederic William (Bill) Quandt, who worked as an assistant to Ansel Adams, and they moved north to Santa Rosa in 1957. There, Bill Quandt operated a successful stereo business downtown, and he and Elizabeth became integral parts of the art scene. Elizabeth attended the Santa Rosa Junior College (SRJC) and taught art at Ursuline High School between the years 1962 and 1964. After the death of Bill Quandt in 1964, she commuted to San Francisco to attend classes once again at the San Francisco Art Institute, eventually earning her B.F.A. and M.F.A. degrees. After Bill's death Elizabeth married painter-sculptor Roger Terry Barr (1921-2000).
Quandt joined the art department of SRJC as a full-time faculty member in 1971, where she was an instructor of printmaking and drawing for fourteen years. Passionate about her work, she created an extensive body of drawings, etchings, watercolors, and livres d’artistes. Quandt illustrated Francis Ponge’s Dix poèms, translated by Serge Gavronsky and printed by Jack Stauffacher in 1983. She also produced two portfolios of etchings, Homage to Boudin: A Suite of Etchings, 1976, and Aries: A Suite of Four Original Etchings, 1978.
Quandt was a member of the California Society of Printmakers and the San Francisco Women Artists, serving as president for the latter between 1952 and 1954. Her work was included in exhibitions with the San Francisco Art Association, the Philadelphia Print Club, the San Francisco Women Artists, the California Society of Printmakers, the National Academy of Design, the Los Angeles Printmakers, and the Boston Printmakers. She had a solo exhibition in 1975 at the Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts in San Francisco and was awarded three Djerassi Foundation Fellowships (1984, 1985, and 1986).
Elizabeth Quandt’s work is represented in the collections of the New York Public Library; Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; the Portland Art Museum, Oregon; the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco; the Santa Rosa Junior College Libraries Doyle Collection, Santa Rosa; the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University, Stanford; and the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
Elizabeth Quandt died in Santa Rosa, California on December 1, 1994.
