• The Big Work

'Truly a labor of love'

"Jam-packed with fascinating history and amazing illustrations from cover to cover!"

Sally Aberg, Carmel Art Association

'An Admirable Tribute'

"Through sharing the rich artistic legacies of the Wallace-Berger family collection, you have truly kept the flame well-lit."

Terry and Paula Trotter, Trotter Galleries

'A Herculean effort'

"...a great job of assembling a lot disparate material. What an amazing family!"

Scott A. Shields, Ph.D. Associate Director and Chief Curator Crocker Art Museum

'310 beautifully produced pages'

Featured in the Oct. 23 edition of The Carmel Pine Cone.

Neal Hotelling, Columnist, Author, and Historian

'I am enjoying it immensely'

"You did a great job putting it together, picking a title, and selecting the sequencing. Nice work ...soon part of The Big Work."

Charley Osborne, Carmel, Calf.

About the Book

The Big Work is a memoir four generations in the making that explores the untold story of the Wallace family, who lived and worked as artists and writers in Carmel, Calif., during America’s most important periods of literature, fine art, journalism, and the occult. Between father, daughter, and son — and the many collaborators between them — the Wallaces produced a vast body of work assembled for the first time in this 311-page anthology, bringing important new context to the past 125 years of California and American art history.

Illuminating the family story is a 200-plus piece art collection of sketches, paintings, and newspaper illustrations created by Grant Wallace (1868-1954) and his two kids: Kevin Wallace (1918 - 1979), a journalist and illustrator, and his prodigy sister Moira (1910-1979), a painter, artist, and muralist who took the San Francisco and Los Angeles art worlds by storm in the 1920s and '30s, but struggled to catch on in the art history books.

The Manuscript

The Big Work features the unpublished memoir of Kevin Wallace (1918-1979), an American journalist and editorial cartoonist for The San Francisco Chronicle and Examiner newspapers, and 10-year staff writer for the New Yorker Magazine.

About the Authors

Featured Press

Historian Neal Hotelling writes a captivating 3-part series of columns about 'The Big Work' in The Carmel Pine Cone. Read all three installments including the first in the series: a profile of Moira Wallace: 'Lady Godiva rode a zebra and an artist became an empress.'

Read the series

200+ Pages of Original Artwork

Explore this vast collection of oil-on-canvas paintings, pencil and pen illustrations, artist sketches, and photographs representing 125 years of California art history and journalism.

Portrait Collection

New Deal-era Art

Historical Documentation

More than three years of research, interviews, and documentation into this body of work provided only a glimpse into the fanstic journey of Grant Wallace and his talented family and friends. Historic newspaper editions and clippings and original artwork unearth the amazing story of these pioneers of the American West.

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