# Paul Lauritz artist context and auction value notes

Canonical page: https://appraisily.com/artist/paul-lauritz/
Profile generated: 2026-05-09T21:34:01.263Z
Quality: high confidence, strong sources

## Artist identity

- Birth date: 1889-04-18
- Death date: 1975-10-31
- Nationality: Norwegian, American
- Movements: California Plein Air Painting
- Common media: Oil painting

## About Paul Lauritz

Paul Lauritz (1889–1975) was a Norwegian-born American painter and educator who became a prominent figure in Southern California's early twentieth-century art scene. Born in Larvik, Norway, he trained at the Larvik Art School before emigrating to North America, where he worked in Canadian and Alaskan mining camps before settling in Portland, Oregon as a commercial artist. In 1919 he relocated to Los Angeles, where he established himself as a landscape painter and joined the Laguna Beach Art Association, the California Art Club, and New York's Salmagundi Club. Lauritz taught at the Chouinard School of Art and the Otis Art Institute and served on the Los Angeles Municipal Art Commission. He is best known for landscape oil paintings that capture the varied terrain of California and the American West.

## Common works and media

Lauritz worked primarily in oil on canvas and board. His most frequently encountered works are landscape paintings depicting California coastlines, deserts, mountains, and rural scenes. Smaller plein air studies and larger studio canvases both appear at auction. Occasional still lifes and figure paintings are known but are less common. Works are typically signed, often in the lower corner.

## Market and appraisal context

Paul Lauritz's oil landscapes appear regularly at auction, with subjects ranging from California coastline and desert vistas to mountain scenes. Factors that affect appraisal include the painting's size, the specific locale depicted, condition, and whether the work can be linked to his Laguna Beach or California Art Club exhibition history. Signed works with clear provenance tend to attract stronger collector interest. Attribution should be verified carefully, as other artists share the Lauritz surname. No published catalogue raisonné is known, so provenance documentation and stylistic comparison to authenticated works are especially important for appraisal purposes.

## Appraisily data basis

Appraisily artist pages combine researched artist identity data from museum, library authority, and encyclopedia sources with auction records that include sale dates, realized prices, lot descriptions, and comparable sales. For Paul Lauritz, identity data is drawn from the Library of Congress Name Authority File, Getty ULAN, VIAF, RKD, and Wikidata, supplemented by auction-house records in the Appraisily database.

## Sources

- Library of Congress: https://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/no2010175710
- Getty Vocabulary Program: https://vocab.getty.edu/page/ulan/500033120
- VIAF: https://viaf.org/viaf/95885480/
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q111650226
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Lauritz
- RKD: https://rkd.nl/en/explore/artists/87763