Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2017/ No.120 i Western Art Collector

For its 32nd Annual Juried Exhibition & Sale, the American Plains Artists makes the New Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum in Los Cruces, New Mexico, its home. The show celebrates the American Great Plains of past and present, and this year 105 twoand three-dimensional artworks will be featured. The works come from 60 artists spanning 17 states, many of them coming from beyond the Great Plains. Cliff Barnes, Glen Edwards, Jammey Huggins, Cheryl Roush and Don Weller are among the featured artists. Their works encompass the people, the life, the landscape and the wildlife of the Great Plains. Two specialty awards will recognize the best work featuring plains people and another will recognize the best work featuring plains churches. “We have emerging artists showing along with more established professional…

AUGUST Aug. 1 Bonhams’ California and Western Paintings Auction Los Angeles, CA – (415) 861-7500 www.bonhams.com Aug. 3-Nov. 5 NEW MEXICO FARM & RANCH HERITAGE MUSEUM American Plains Artists’ 32nd Annual Juried Exhibition and Sale Las Cruces, NM – (308) 249-1488 www.americanplainsartists.com Aug. 4-27 THE BRINTON MUSEUM Bighorn Rendezvous Art Show and Sale Big Horn, WY – (307) 672-3173 www.thebrintonmuseum.org Aug. 4-Sept. 2 THE OWINGS GALLERY Ed Mell Santa Fe, NM – (505) 982-6244 www.theowingsgallery.com Aug. 5-Sept. 24 PHIPPEN ART MUSEUM Hold Your Horses Invitational Exhibition & Sale Prescott, AZ – (928) 778-1385 www.phippenartmuseum.org Ending Aug. 6 EITELJORG MUSEUM Dogs: Faithful and True Indianapolis, IN - (317) 636-9378 www.eiteljorg.org Ending Aug. 6 PASADENA MUSEUM OF CALIFORNIA ART Gustave Baumann in California Pasadena, CA – (626) 568-3665 www.pmcaonline.org Ending Aug. 6…

When Jim Norton was asked to appear before the Cowboy Artists of America in 1989, he thought it was all just a formality so they could see his work. He was never even really sure if he would meet the members. “It took Howard Terpning three times to get in, so I guess I didn’t think this was any big deal,” Norton says. “I didn’t even bring my cowboy hat because my wife and I were headed down to San Diego to see the [Joaquín Sorolla] exhibition. I left it at home.” So when Bill Moyers came out later to break the good news to Norton—and painter Roy Andersen, who was also present—the artist was a little surprised, to say the least. “I hadn’t even met these guys yet,” Norton…

From the limestone barns of the Pennsylvania Dutch to open-sided tobacco barns to large western barns for both cattle and hay, the American barn is a fixture of the landscape. Whether weathered or brightly painted, barns are rugged and serve their purpose for generations. Dolly Parton grew up in rural Appalachia and she knows barns. She said, “I compare myself to a good barn. You can have a good barn, and if you paint it, it looks a little better. But if you take the paint off, it’s still a good barn.” Even the 19th century transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson wasn’t so much in his head that he didn’t appreciate barns. He wrote, “I like to have a person’s knowledge comprehend more than one class of topics, one row of…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 13 works Aug. 19-Sept. 17, 2017 Maxwell Alexander Gallery 1505 S. Santa Fe Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90021 (310) 839-9242 Eric Bowman lives in Tigard, Oregon, not far from Oregon City, where the famous Oregon Trail comes to an end after more than 2,000 miles—he essentially lives and works at the “end of the trail.” Of course, The End of the Trail is also the name of James Earle Fraser’s most iconic works. It’s a phrase, succinct and memorable, that has many meanings in the West. “Being on the West Coast, literally at the end of the trail, as far west as it goes, it really inspired me to paint some of my new work, whether it’s trail rides, lost burros or riders who have lost their…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 22 works Aug. 18-Sept. 23, 2017 EVOKE Contemporary 550 S. Guadalupe Street Santa Fe, NM 87501 (505) 995-9902 August has traditionally been the month EVOKE Contemporary in Santa Fe, New Mexico, celebrates the life and art of Louisa McElwain. This summer the tradition continues, four years after her tragic death. Louisa McElwain: Oil of Joy opens August 18 and continues through September 23. The 22 paintings are comprised of the large paintings of spectacular northern New Mexico skies for which she is well known and earlier works executed in her joyful painterly style. Although she loved the landscape around her 10-acre “gentle person’s farm” she said, “I never want to forget that what I am looking at is paint on canvas.” She could often be seen…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 20 works August 17-24, 2017 Mountain Trails Gallery 155 Center Street Jackson, WY 83001 (307) 734-8150 Fluid brushstrokes help bring movement and life to Amy Lay’s wildlife paintings that are characterized not only by her technique but also through a distinct color palette. Depicted on her canvases are bears, foxes, rabbits and deer in colors that are reminiscent of the natural world with a bit of flair with reds and purples. Another hallmark of Lay’s pieces is that the initial drawing on the canvas is part of the final work, as it is seen through the layers of oil. “I think my color palette is so recognizable because it’s so simple,” says Lay. “It goes back to a basic watercolor palette that always seems to work…

UPCOMING GROUP SHOW Up to 20 works August 11-20, 2017 The Legacy Gallery 7 W. Main Street Bozeman, MT 59715 (406) 577-2810 Whether the subject matter is landscapes, garden scenes or floral still lifes, the draw to nature is alive and well in the paintings of Kathy Anderson and Mark Boedges. Anderson’s works are bountiful and oftentimes intimate, highlighting the forms and lushness of flowers as well as aspens and elk. Painted primarily in plein air, Boedges’ scenes are vast and familiar, depicting the streams and farms close to where he lives near Lake Champlain in Vermont, and some from Mount Baker in Washington. Along with their shared love of the outdoors, Anderson and Boedges are members of the Putney Painters in Vermont, and they have exhibited together at the…

Theodore Waddell is connected to the land and to the animals that live on it. Both are part of his life and both appear in his art. A new book, Theodore Waddell: My Montana, Painting and Sculpture, 1959-2016, has recently been published by the Drumlummon Institute in Helena, Montana. Edited by the poet and critic, and Drumlummon executive director Rick Newby, the book brings together essays by scholars and friends of the artist who not only place his work in the context of Montana but in the context of the wider art world and among the people who have influenced his life and work. Robyn Peterson, executive director of the Yellowstone Art Museum, nominated Waddell for the 2015 Montana Governor’s Arts Award. In her remarks introducing him at the award…

Home to the famed Western artist Charles M. Russell, Montana’s the mountain ranges, prairies and plains have been an inspiration to artists for centuries. The state is home to many galleries, museums and artists that hold the natural beauty of the state landscape in highest regard. Home to Glacier National Park, which is known as the Crown of the Continent, as well as portions of Yellowstone National Park, Montana and its vast open spaces have earned the nickname Big Sky Country. Other nationally recognized sites such as Little Bighorn National Monument, Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area, Big Hole National Battlefield, and the National Bison Range should not be overlooked, and offer artists unparalleled views. In Kalispell, the Hockaday Museum of Art aims to preserve the legacy of Glacier National Park,…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 12 works Aug. 4-Sept. 2, 2017 The Owings Gallery 120 E. Marcy Street Santa Fe, NM 87501 (505) 982-6244 Ed Mell has been drawing since he was a boy growing up in Phoenix. Born in 1942, it wasn’t until the 1970s that he began to reacquaint himself with “the open and free spirit of the West.” He eventually left a successful career in advertising and illustration in New York to paint the landscapes of the West. He had always been interested in design. “I was into cars. I wanted to be a car designer. My dad had a good eye and designed modern furniture. My two brothers were artists and designers.” Although he never designed automobiles, he can be seen driving around Phoenix in one of…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 10 works August 11-20, 2017 Astoria Fine Art 35 E. Deloney Avenue Jackson Hole, WY 83001 (307) 733-4016 Utah painter G. Russell Case can sympathize with magazine writers when it comes to selecting his subject matter—both jobs require careful editing. Words for one, nature for the other. “When you’re in the field and every angle is incredible you end up editing your work and making tough decisions on what you paint and what you don’t paint,” Case says. “Usually the decisions come down to design principles, whether it’s the simple shapes, or the foreground, or something I can play with in the scene. There is always too much to choose from.” The question of editing his subjects came up in a discussion about one of his new…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 12 works Aug. 25-Sept. 3, 2017 Joe Wade Fine Art 102 E. Water Street Santa Fe, NM 87501 (505) 9882727 Roger Williams travels throughout the Southwest and around the world and returns to his studio in Santa Fe to paint. “I grew up in Alamosa, Colorado,” he says, “and I was always running around looking at ruins in the Four Corners. I’ve been to most of the major ruins in the Southwest and many minor ruins. I enjoy looking at and studying those ancient Pueblo cultures, but I stick to representations of the post-contact period after horses and sheep and other animals had been introduced. I romanticize the settings but stay accurate to the domestic manifestations of the culture. “I’ve also lived in Colombia and Mexico,” he…

Gaye Sekula enjoys capturing the wonder of the fleeting moment. She feels the emotion and liveliness of a subject are best captured in simplicity and finds vignettes most suitable to her style. Sekula refers to painting as meditation. She says, “It is being present and keenly aware, yet letting for and trusting in all you have learned so far. Whether it is described as ‘following the muse,’ ‘feeling the hand of God on yours’ or ‘being in the flow,’ it is something undefinable, yet undeniable.” Sekula grew up in a small town just south of San Antonio, Texas, and spent much of her early years in the country. The oldest of eight children, she was her father’s shadow, loving everything he loved. Her love for her father, a cowboy, and…

With the successful debut of Bighorn Rendezvous last August, the Brinton Museum welcomes back 32 members of the Northwest Rendezvous Group of Artists and five guests to Big Horn, Wyoming, for a second edition of the show and sale. Kenneth L. Schuster, director and chief curator of the museum, describes last year’s event as “busy, crowded and great fun” and says that the 2017 edition will expand further to become an even more attractive outing for collectors. The opening weekend festivities take place August 4 through 6. On August 4 will be the artists’ reception, where patrons can preview the artwork in the show—four by each member artists and three from every guest—from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. The next day, August 5, attendees will be treated to a brand new…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 10 works August 21-31, 2017 Astoria Fine Art 35 E. Deloney Avenue Jackson, WY 83001 (307) 733-4016 In Ed Kucera’s latest show of Western works at Astoria Fine Art, rugged terrains take on a life of their own. Growing up in the American West, Kucera has always been struck by the challenge the landscapes present to travelers, which is the subject matter of his large oil Obstacles. In it, travelers struggled to navigate their way through a monumental canyon. “I’ve always been impressed by the theme of man being such a small part of nature,” Kucera says. “Nature is just so much more powerful, more dominant, than any man made force.” The West is also a place of joy, as is evident in New Pony. Kucera…

With more than 700 guests in attendance, and more than $3 million in sales reported from opening weekend alone, the Prix de West exhibition kicked off June 9 at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. Not only did the event outsell last year’s show by more than a quarter million dollars, it drew a larger crowd, creating a cozy and congenial atmosphere in the main hall that leads into the exhibition as artists, museums patrons and collectors were shoulder to shoulder amid the displays of painted works on the wall and bronze works on pedestals interspersed within the crowd. Top winners at this year’s show were Curt Walters, who won the buyer’s choice award for his 70-by-60-inch Grand Canyon landscape Compilation of the Gods; George Hallmark…

The Buffalo Bill Center of the West in Cody, Wyoming, and the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma, have partnered to present the groundbreaking new exhibition Albert Bierstadt: Witness to a Changing West, opening June 8, 2018. The exhibition will feature some of the artist’s most important works, including the epic Native American scene The Last of the Buffalo, which maintains a significant presence at the Cody museum. “Bierstadt is best known as America’s premier Western landscape artist. He was also a renowned history painter, a rarely discussed element of his legacy. This major exhibition will address Bierstadt in context of his treatment not just of majestic mountains and lakes but more prominently of bison and American Indians, whom he approached as key subjects for his art,” according to the museum.…

The 31st annual Trappings of Texas at the Museum of the Big Bend at Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas, kicked off April 20 to 22 with a weekend of festivities. The event, which celebrates the ranching lifestyle, featured custom cowboy gear along with fine paintings and sculpture. There was interest across mediums from collectors, allowing for strong sales during the opening week. The show remained on view at the museum through May 28 with any unsold works of art available for purchase. “The 2017 Trappings of Texas was a very successful event for both the Museum of the Big Bend and the artists participating in the show. We had very good attendance at all events and sponsorships to Trappings was at an all-time high,” says Mary Bones, the…

When Joel Piassick began our conversation about his and his wife Karen’s collection he mentioned the word “eclectic.” I blurted out, “You give new meaning to the word ‘eclectic.’” The wonderful breadth of the collection runs from classic Rose Medallion Chinese export porcelain to antique and contemporary face jugs. Their paintings range from a Southern folk art train made from mud and pigment to a large contemporary painting by Logan Maxwell Hagege. They both brought family heirlooms to the collection. Sculpture ranges from a cast of Cyrus Dallin’s Appeal to the Great Spirit to a pixilated wooden sculpture of a Vulture by Shawn Smith perched ominously above the front door. The couple met Smith in Austin, Texas, where they were visiting their daughter. They purchased a sculpture of a fox…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 30 works Aug. 18-Sept. 1, 2017 Manitou Galleries 123 W. Palace Avenue Santa Fe, NM 87501 (505) 986-0440 Santa Fe, New Mexico, is not only one of the most culturally rich cities in the United States, it is also one of the oldest, having been continuously inhabited for more than a thousand years, first by Pueblo Indians, and later Spanish and Mexican settlers, cowboys and their vaquero counterparts and, of course, artists. Like painters Marsden Hartley, John Sloan, Georgia O’Keeffe and many others before him, Kim Wiggins gravitated to Santa Fe’s rich history in the arts and culture. “I lived in Santa Fe for a number of years on Canyon Road. It’s been an important place in my heart and in my work,” says Wiggins, who…

UPCOMING SHOW Up to 12 works August 4-11, 2017 Mountain Trails Gallery 155 Center Street Jackson, WY 83001 (307) 734-8150 Mark Gibson goes through phases of inspiration. Last year, it was eastern Montana and long horizons. This year, his show at Mountain Trails Gallery features the timber and tall mountains of Western Montana. The majority of his paintings are nocturnes, lit up teepees contrasting against the dusk or nighttime skies, like in Lone Bison Lodge and Rocky Mountain Fire. Many of the new works will also feature bodies of water. “It’s so much fun to create those really soft edges,” Gibson says. “I’m inspired by those dark, long shadows. The contrast between the lit up teepees and the sky is really nice.” For this series of paintings, he finds inspiration…

UPCOMING GROUP SHOW Up to 100 works August 1-31, 2017 Trailside Galleries 130 E. Broadway Jackson, WY 83001 (307) 733-3186 Throughout August, Trailside Galleries in Jackson, Wyoming, will present an exhibition featuring artwork by members of the Society of Animal Artists. The show will highlight an array of subjects—North American mammals and birds to jungle creatures and animals of the African deserts. This diversity is just one aspect of the breadth of the wildlife genre, with the works also being done in a multitude of styles and mediums, making each work unique to the individual artist. Sculptor Dan Chen will present his fish sculpture The Journey of Return, which he says is about familial generations. “We are here because of the last generation and have a responsibility to keep the…

Returning for its third year at the Hockaday Museum of Art, A Timeless Legacy: Women Artists of Glacier National Park honors the legacy of historic women artists who painted the park along with contemporary Western women artists. “There’s so much majesty in the park,” says Tracy Johnson, executive director of Hockaday. “With the show, we’re honoring the artists’ time in the park as well as their hardships.” This year, 28 artists will participate in the show, including Sandy Scott, Rebecca Tobey, Deborah Berniklau, Nancy Dunlop Cawdrey, Linda Glover Gooch and Darcie Peet. “It’s a great opportunity for artists to learn from each other and spend time together,” Johnson says. “It’s also a great time for collectors and patrons to get to know the artists and their stories.” Terry Cooke Hall…

This August, the Heart of the West Show & Auction will return to Bozeman, Montana, with over 50 artists exhibiting their paintings and sculptures at the Best Western Plus GranTree Inn. The Heart of the West is a family run affair, with show director Morgan Cawdrey running it with guidance from his father Steven Cawdrey and his mother, artist Nancy Dunlop-Cawdrey. “As artists ourselves, my mom and I have always found these in-person shows are essential to getting our work exposed to new areas and communities, and I felt that Bozeman was overdue for a major fine art show of this kind. The community response to the August 2016 show was super encouraging,” Morgan says. Zoot Art Gallery returns as a major sponsor of the show, and the gallery will…