Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2020/ No. 152 i Western Art Collector

When Howard Post, the famous Western Wpainter, was around 4 years old his family moved into a house near the Catalina Foothills in northern Tucson, Arizona. It was there he learned to ride horses, raise cattle and where his interest in art took hold. Now, decades later, the home is once again filled with art as the headquarters for SculptureTucson. The home, now known as the historic Post House, was built in the 1940s. The Post family moved into it in the early 1950s. Howard Post’s parents lived in it until they passed away in the 1990s, after which Howard’s brother lived in it with his family for a decade. The property was eventually sold to Pima County, who turned it into Brandi Fenton Memorial Park. “We needed a headquarters…

MARCH March 27 SETTLERS WEST GALLERIES Women Artists of the West 50th Anniversary National Exhibition Tucson, AZ – (520) 299-2607 www.settlerswest.com March 27-April 18 BLUE RAIN GALLERY An Homage to Oscar Berninghaus Santa Fe, NM – (505) 954-9902 www.blueraingallery.com March 27-May 4 BRISCOE WESTERN ART MUSEUM Night of Artists San Antonio, TX – (210) 299-4499 www.briscoemuseum.org March 27-May 10 DESERT CABALLEROS WESTERN MUSEUM Cowgirl Up! Art from the Other Half of the West Wickenburg, AZ – (928) 684-2272 www.westernmuseum.org March 28 BOOTH WESTERN ART MUSEUM Southeastern Chuck Wagon Gathering Cartersville, GA – (770) 387-1300 www.boothmuseum.org Through March 31 MAXWELL ALEXANDER GALLERY Eric Merrell & David Grossmann Los Angeles, CA – (213) 275-1060 www.maxwellalexandergallery.com APRIL April 2-5 WESTERN SPIRIT: SCOTTSDALE’S MUSEUM OF THE WEST Cowboy Artists of America Miniature Sale Scottsdale, AZ…

Rick Gates says, “I’ve been a collector all my life, acquiring various things depending on my finances. I’m just a sod buster from Idaho and I started out with minor contemporary art just to hang in my house. In 1995 Steve Rose introduced me to higher-end Western art.” The late Steve Rose owned the Biltmore Gallery in Scottsdale, Arizona, which had been started by Charlie Russell and Frank Tenney Johnson in California in 1924. “I graduated to collecting fairly significant pieces that I’ve sold over time while upgrading my collection as most collectors do,” he says. “I’ve always felt privileged to be the temporary custodian of what I consider to be really fine art. I went for quality, the best of its kind, and most of the time the price…

The animals in Kat Kinnick’s paintings gaze out at the viewer, inviting a return gaze, a recognition of their existence. She says, “My paintings are invitations to turn our attention towards the natural beauty that is unfolding around us, and I believe that if our culture loved our wilderness, it would be better protected. My heart is leading me to make this work because my heart resides with our wilderness.” A native of northern New Mexico, she lives near Lone Butte and the Cerrillos Mountains south of Santa Fe, amid the flora and fauna of the high desert. Her paintings, drawings, prints and decorated ceramics depict fearless playful animals, at home in their environment despite the many threats to it. She received her BFA in interdisciplinary sculpture with a concentration…

An upcoming exhibition at Manitou Galleries in Santa Fe, New Mexico, looks at the art of the impasto, a technique in which paint is applied to a surface in visibly thick layers, often exaggerating the aesthetic of the brushstroke or palette knife. Paintings often appear highly textured, with portions of pigment emerging from the canvas itself, creating a quasi-three-dimensional vibe. Titled The Great Impasto, the exhibition runs from April 3 to 26 and includes artists Jeff Cochran, Ulrich Gleiter, Martha Goetz, Brad Teare and Jerry Jordan. Teare began his career doing woodcut illustrations for clients in New York City, eventually experimenting with color woodcuts and plein air painting. “I evolved a painterly style of woodcut printing while simultaneously falling in love with the landscape,” says the artist. “My technique is…

Like most auction houses, the Scottsdale Art Auction has seen an upward tick when it comes to online bids, and this year will likely be no exception to that rising trend. But auction partner Brad Richardson, who is thrilled to see more bidders getting comfortable with online bidding, also offers this word of advice: nothing beats being in the room during an art auction. “When you’re buying an important painting or sculpture, you want to see it in person, and we see that over and over again with some of our best collectors—they just want to be in the room to see it all happen,” he says. “And when you add 500 other bidders in the room, it can get very exciting very quickly.” It’s that excitement that has made…

The last time the Cowboy Artists of America made work available to purchase in Arizona was 2010. Since then the CA has held shows in Oklahoma and recently, to great acclaim, in Fort Worth, Texas. Meanwhile, Arizona waited in the wings, ever so patiently. A decade later, the Grand Canyon State will once again play host to a sale and exhibition for the famed group of Western artists when Western Spirit: Scottsdale’s Museum of the West presents The Gathering: Cowboy Artists of America Annual Western Miniatures Show and Sale on April 2. The miniature sale will feature artwork from the majority of the current members, as well as art from some of the emeritus members. The Cowboy Artists of America have had a long and storied history, with much of…

Charles Fritz studied history in college, and history is the backbone of his intensely researched paintings of the Old West. His pursuit of historical accuracy led him to retrace the route of Lewis and Clark’s expedition and to produce paintings illustrating passages from their journals and field notes effectively becoming An Artist with the Corps of Discovery, the title of a book of the paintings. Fritz paints in plein air and from life to capture the actuality and vitality of the landscape and his subjects. Splain’n the Why illustrates a moment in the life of settlers from the east heading west. Stopped in the vastness of the prairie, a settler converses with his wife while an older couple looks on. Accompanied by their dog and their oxen, the older woman…

Oscar E. Berninghaus (1874-1952) first visited Taos, New Mexico, in 1899, traveling by train as a commercial artist for the Denver and Rio Grande Railroad. He often sat in a chair secured to the top of the baggage car to get a better view. During a visit to Taos he met Bert Geer Phillips (1868-1956) who became his friend. He returned to Taos in the summers to paint the Pueblo people and the environs, eventually settling there in 1925. In 1915, he and Phillips were among the founding members of the Taos Society of Artists. Blue Rain Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico, is presenting Homage to Oscar E. Berninghaus, March 27 through April 18. Blue Rain artists have been invited to “select an original composition painted by Oscar E.…

All things Southwest will take center stage during John Moran Auctioneers’ upcoming California & American Fine Art Sale on April 19 at 2 p.m. There will be California landscapes, desert visits and Old West imagery among the most sought-after items hitting the block. The sale will be tightly curated at around 100 lots, with the Western items being among the most anticipated in this spring sale. “We are featuring works by Nicolai Fechin and Frank Tenney Johnson that are really prominent,” says Morgana Blackwelder, the auction house’s director of fine art. “I think they are A-list items to add to any sort of Western art collection.” The Fechin work is an untitled painting featuring a road through a desert landscape, likely Taos, New Mexico, where the artist lived for a…

Strip down the various expansions and upgrades at Sthe Gilcrease Museum and you end up with one building built in 1913 and four layers of renovation that occurred between 1940 and 1987. A recent exhaustive analysis of the site in Tulsa, Oklahoma, determined that another expansion or another renovation would not be enough to meet the growing needs for the museum. But an entire new facility would. The Gilcrease Museum has announced it plans to build a new museum facility to house and exhibit the 350,000 objects related to the art, history and culture of North America. The project will begin with a two-year initial design phase, during which the museum will remain open, and then a two-year construction phase that will necessitate the closure of the museum, though the…

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Cast your mind back to high school biology. Never fear, no pickled frogs or planaria will be harmed in the making of this introduction to the art of Maynard Dixon and to the baker’s dozen of the artist’s works that will be on offer at the Scottsdale Art Auction on April 4. Ready? Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny. Short definition: the development of the embryo of an animal goes through stages resembling the evolution of the animal’s ancestors. The human embryo, as an example, starts as a cell, then looks like a fish, amphibian, bird, then looks like various four-legged mammals before becoming a primate and, finally, an example of homo sapiens. Long discredited in biology—so there won’t be a test—the idea has perhaps become even more useful as a metaphor in art…

After the obvious “everything’s bigger Texas” expression, if there’s one thing people imagine when thinking of the Lone Star State, it’s that signature Western landscape. Home of Big Bend National Park in western Texas, Caprock Canyons State Park in the north, and Texas Hill Country in the central part of the state, the geological diversity—as well as the state’s frontier history—has inspired artists for centuries. The Museum of Western Art in Kerrville pays homage to cowboy artists working from the mid-20th century to today. With a collection of nearly 150 sculptures and 250 paintings, the museum represents the likes of the Taos Society of Artists like Oscar E. Berninghaus and Eanger Irving Couse, as well as many other greats such as Joe Beeler, George Phippen and dozens more. Heading way…

Although this isn’t the first rodeo for Western-inspired artists Brian Grimm and David Griffin, it will be their first two-man show together with InSight Gallery in Fredericksburg, Texas. While both artists exude talent in the landscape depictions of the American West, they each bring different flavors to the table in the upcoming show The West and the Wild. Griffin explains, “Brian and I have been put together in a lot of shows, but when asked by InSight Gallery who I wanted to join me for a two-man show, I immediately said Brian Grimm. Funny enough, I was his first pick as well.” Griffin looks forward to the collaboration and connection that both of their work ignites. While Griffin began his artistic career by including a figure such as a cowboy…

The 38th annual Southeastern Wildlife Exposition, which took place February 12 to 14, was a smash success, with numbers surpassing last year’s already record-breaking event. Held in locations throughout downtown Charleston, the not-for-profit event puts wildlife art and conservation front and center. The event showcases the work of such artists as Jason Tako, Mitch Baird, Jim Bortz, Kathryn Ashcroft, Kelly Brewer and many others. The annual event is considered one of the largest wildlife conservation and art events in the country. “The 38th annual Southeastern Wildlife Exposition proved to be a tremendous success for artists and collectors alike. We were pleased to host works by distinguished sculptors like Walter Matia and Stefan Savides, celebrated painters like Joseph Sulkowski, Julie Jeppsen and Ezra Tucker. We also welcomed 15 new artists,” says…