Jack Lestrade Carmel Art Association Artist Member Jack Lestrade passed away on August 6, 2025, at the age of 93 at his home in France. This French-born painter was widely celebrated for his luminous watercolors, many created on his many journeys around the globe. Born on March 27, 1932, this self-taught artist joined the Merchant Marine at age fifteen. Thus began his life of adventure, travel, and his passion: painting. After spending five years in Canada working in advertising, he settled in Southern California in 1960. Then in 1972 he moved to Carmel where he devoted himself fully to fine art for nearly three decades years. Jack and his wife—pianist, organist, singer and songwriter Judy Blair—divided their time between the Monterey Peninsula and travels abroad. In 1994 they decided to move back permanently to the Lot region of southwest France where he continued to paint up until his passing. His delicately rendered scenes of coastlines, villages, and countryside landscapes earned him international recognition. He exhibited at the National Academy of Design in New York City; Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma; National Academy of Wester Art in Oklahoma City; Colorado History Museum of Denver; the Great American Artists show in Cincinnati; Westbrook Gallery in Chicago; Sternberg Galleries in Scottsdale; the Brennen Collection in Santa Fe; and the Carmel Art Association. Jack was named an Artist of America “Master” in Denver, Colorado, having exhibited in their formerly annual national exhibition for sixteen years. He is also a member of Artists Fellowship of New York City and the La Maison des Artistes in France. He was awarded Academician status with the Academie Internationale des Arts et Lettres de France, an international cultural association for whom he showed his paintings for the first time in Montauban and Toulouse, France, from 2004 to 2007, winning a prize and a silver medal.