He was a leading figure of American Impressionism, known for his architectural paintings and those documenting his travels to “the Orient.” By the time Colin Campbell Cooper settled in Santa Barbara in 1921, he had established himself as a prominent artist of his era.

Better known on the East Coast for much of the 20th century, Cooper had a bit of a West Coast renaissance in the 1970s, when a number of his works were discovered in the basement of Santa Barbara City Hall, renovated, and put on display. Then, just more than 10 years ago, Sullivan Goss acquired the artist’s estate from his descendents. Now, for the first time, the downtown gallery is displaying nearly 80 of Cooper’s small-scale studies. These are not the monumental, formal paintings for which Cooper is best known. Instead, these works show the artist at his most instinctive. Painted primarily in water-based gouache and measuring no larger than four by seven inches, these tiny images display a looseness and freedom that didn’t often translate into the finished versions.

DESCRIBED AS POSTCARDS OF SORTS, Sullivan Goss has followed up its well received Lockwood de Forest exhibit with a show from another of their extraordinary estates, that of American Impressionist, Colin Campbell Coopere. Titled Stills from a Life's Cinema, the exhibit will be on view through July 3rd in their Messick Gallery.