Nancy Jean Barron

Long-time Aptos resident Nancy Jean Barron, a talented painter, jazz singer, creative performer, loving wife and mother to three children died Sunday, September 6th following a hospital stay in Watsonville, California.

Nancy was born December 28, 1930 as the second child of Charles and Jessie Camp in Berkeley, where she grew up. Her father, Charles Camp, was a professor of paleontology at the University of California, Berkeley for 40 years, and was famed for his dinosaur discoveries and long service as Department Chair. Her mother and sister, Patsy McCluskey, were both elementary school teachers in California.

Nancy's distinctive talents were recognized from an early age. She was awarded the prize for Outstanding Achievement in graduating from Brownmore School for Girls Phoenix, Arizona, where she was captain of the basketball team in addition to her performances in music and drama.

She began her studies at the University of California at Berkeley in Dramatic Art and Music, but as she noted in one of her journals: "From a career standpoint, the most important decision I made was to take a leave of absence from the university at the end of my junior year in order to pursue a career in music and acting." She studied at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music where she had a voice scholarship and trained primarily in opera, and went on to sing professionally, mostly in the Los Angeles area, at such prominent venues as the Desert Inn in Las Vegas and the Troubadour Coffee House in Los Angeles. Known as Nancy Miller during this period of time she also acted in a number of plays and had two small parts in motion pictures, notably the role of "first woman" in Oscar-winner Irwin Allen's "The Story of Mankind" 20th Century Fox starring Ronald Colman, Hedy Lamarr, The Marx Brothers, Agnes Moorehead, Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Dennis Hopper and others. Other roles included: "the mistress" in Genet's The Maids, Clytemnestra in The Libation Bearers, and Eurydice in Antigone. She was a member of the Screen Actors Guild, the American Guild of Variety Artists, and the Musicians Union. This era is also reflected in over a dozen studio-recorded jazz songs her family treasures, featuring her velvety voice and immaculate timing and romantic sensibilities.

In 1959 Nancy returned to Berkeley to complete her studies at the university. A new era in her life began when she met Dr. Frank Barron, the renowned creativity scholar and professor. They married January 20, 1961, and had their first two children in the next three years Frank and Brigid. In fall of 1964, she again enrolled in the university in graduate courses to study painting, with additional studies at the S.F. Art Institute and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, Italy Accademia di Bell' Arte, in 1965. She studied with Elmer Bischoff one of the chief innovators of the Bay Area Figurative Painting School that emerged in the 1950s, Don Weygandt, and Jack Zajac. After the birth of their third child Anthea in 1968, Dr. Barron accepted an offer as professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and they left Berkeley for Aptos, and lived in a home near the sea.

In her extensive portfolio of art work in the spirit of the Figurative Painting School, with over 100 canvases, she is best known for her southwestern landscapes, her large-canvas sized dramatic portraits of entertainers and actors, and in another mood, dreamlike human and animal figures as in "African Dream", "The Cat and the Moon", and her prize winning "Woman Daydreaming in a Chair". Two of these were used as illustrations for book covers, and the latter, created in her first year of art school, was awarded first prize in a UC Berkeley student art competition judged by Richard Diebenkorn. Her early work reflects the figurative expressionism of the San Francisco School in the 1960's. She also attributes to her father's book EARTHSONG much of the inspiration for her landscapes as well as for "African Dream".

Her artwork was shown in galleries in Italy and in the Santa Cruz area. She has had one-person shows at the Crown College Library at UCSC, and at the historic Bay View Hotel in Aptos, and her work appeared in juried group shows of N.O.W. and of the UCSC Women's Alumni Association and the Santa Cruz County Fair. The UCSC Stevenson College Library featured a retrospective of her drawings and paintings for several months, and her paintings were exhibited at the Charles Campbell Gallery, 647 Chestnut Street, San Francisco. Nancy's other activities in the art world included co-ownership with Coleen Kiebert of the 303 Gallery in Santa Cruz. She also created set designs and acted in several plays at UCSC.

Nancy also was a teacher, in keeping with her family tradition. For many years she served as a substitute teacher for Pajaro Valley Unified School District and volunteered as an art teacher at Rio del Mar Elementary School. Her study of art in education finally led to a Master of Arts degree from UC Santa Cruz.

Nancy is preceded in death by her husband, parents and two brothers, Charles and Roderick Camp. She is survived by her three children: Frank Charles Xavier Barron, Brigid Jessica Sarah Barron, Anthea Rose Maeve Barron and her sister Patricia McCluskey of Roseville CA.

A private family memorial celebrating Nancy's life, music and art will be held Saturday, September 12, 2009.