The following description for has been prepared entirely by the current owner, Roberts S. Fastov, Esq., and, at the collector’s request, has not been edited by Sloans & Kenyon

Note 1) The following Hesthal biographical materials are taken from the Askart.com website:

“Biography from Crocker Art Museum Store:

Painter, muralist, lithographer, etcher. Born in San Francisco, CA on Aug. 24, 1908. At age nine Hesthal began attending the Saturday classes of Alice B. Chittenden at the CSFA and at ten, first exhibited in the San Francisco Art Assn annual. During the 1920's he was a founding member of the Modern Gallery (San Francisco) and in 1929 spent eight months painting in Maupitie in the Society Islands. In 1934 he was one of 26 artists chosen by the federal government under the Public Works of Art Project to paint murals (Railroad and Shipping) in San Francisco's Coit Tower. He used a Senator Phelan Award to study in China and was in Peking when the city was taken by the Japanese. Several painting trips were made to Mexico, the first in 1941 on a Rosenberg Fellowship. Hesthal settled in Santa Barbara in 1942 and joined the staff of the Santa Barbara Museum as a curator in 1954. During the 1960's he taught drawing, art appreciation, and history at Moorpark and Ventura colleges; and, in the 1970's, at the Santa Barbara Art Institute. Hesthal was active as an artist in Santa Barbara until his death on Jan. 5, 1985. Member: SWA; SFAA; Mural Artists of SF; Calif. Society of Etchers. Exh: SFAA, 1924-29, 1935 (1st prize); SFMA Inaugural, 1935; GGIE, 1939; NY World's Fair, 1939; Santa Barbara Museum, 1943, 1947, 1948, 1953 (solos), 1985 (memorial). In: SF Art Institute Library (mural); Mills College Music Room, (panels); Tamalpais High School, Mill Valley (mosaic panels). Invw; From Expo to Expo; SF Chronicle, 5-12-1935; WWAA 1936-41; CAR; Santa Barbara News-Press, 1-8-1985 (obit).

Note 2) The foregoing considerations and the fact that Hesthal's most recent auction sale, “Over the hill” (see below), which brought $3,416 was painted in virtually the same size, the same technique and style, and manifested nighttime desolation and isolation in stark realistic terms in and around the city of San Francisco, consistent with one of the American Regionalist School favorite subjects “city views” in the Depression era, as this action's painting, “The Fort,”

which was Hesthal's take on the famous San Francisco landmark, The Presidio, and which was exhibited at the 55^th Annual San Francisco Art Association in 1935, warrant the conclusion that the presale estimate of $3,000-$3,500 is reasonable and justifiable.

Title/Subject: Over the hill Signed. Oil on canvas. 25 in. x 23 in. sold for $3,416 on 08/09/2011 at Bonhams & Butterfields, San Francisco CA