Burra Family Community Room

Merry and Bright: The Christmas Cards of Ralph Hulett

November 9, 2024 – January 11, 2025

Curated by Mary Platt

Sparkling with Midcentury Modern style and pizzazz, the Christmas card designs of California Scene painter and Disney artist Ralph Hulett (1915-1974) are classics. Hulett studied at Chouinard – where his instructors included Millard Sheets, Phil Dike and Phil Paradise – and started work for Walt Disney Studios’ first animated feature, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, while still a student. He worked for Walt Disney Studios for 37 years as a background artist, and his brilliant watercolor backgrounds appear in almost every Disney animated feature from Pinocchio to Robin Hood.

He also was a prolific fine-art watercolorist and oil painter, focusing on cityscapes and landscapes of Los Angeles and Southern California. One of his most successful revenue streams, however, came from his card designs. From the 1940s to the 1970s, he created hundreds of lively, colorful Christmas card designs for companies such as Designers Showcase and California Artists.

For your holiday enjoyment, here is a sampling of Hulett’s cards from The Hilbert Collection.