Texas - Art

Signed limited edition print from acclaimed photographer, Jim Herrington of Dolly Parton taken in Joelton, Tennessee, 1997 Archival pigment print on Hahnemuhle Baryta 315 gsm, acid...

Signed limited edition print from acclaimed photographer, Jim Herrington of Dolly Parton taken in Nashville, Tennessee, in 2000 Archival pigment print on Hahnemuhle Baryta 315 gsm...

Signed limited editon print from acclaimed photographer, Jim Herrington of Dolly Parton taken in Joelton, Tennessee, 1997 "Love this one of Dolly. It's so striking and glamorous an...

Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson taken performing together on stage in San Antonio Texas back in February 1977 by photographer Scott Newton Available in three sizes, printed to the hi...

Page Size: 20 x 24 in. (visible) Frame size : 47 x 32 in. Signed, bottom right. Numbered, Bottom left: 144/200. COA available upon request. Created by Pablo Picasso in 1961, this ic...

Pastel toned coastal seaside landscape oil on canvas painting by French Impressionist artist Henry Moret. The work features a pair of figures walking along the water's edge as clouds...

Signed print taken from an original color slide of Kurt Cobain of Nirvana taking a nap by Kirk Weddle. This slide was taken during the famous swimming pool sessions with Nirvana for ...

French abstract in tones of blues, black and purple, 1980s. Original artwork on paper displayed on a white mat with a gold border. Mat fits a standard-size frame. Archival pla...

Lively abstract painting with primary tones of yellows, reds and greens with accents of blue and black on white background, 1952. Signed lower right. Original artwork on paper dis...

The Beatles, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr at the President Hotel, Russell Square, London, 12 September 1963 by Norman Parkinson NORMAN PARKINSON POST...

Texan politician and former Texas governor, Ann Richards with Dolly Parton taken at the Driskill Hotel, Austin Texas in 1982 by photographer Scott Newton Photographers notes: We wer...

Richard Schmid (1934-2021) California, Vermont, Colorado, Illinois, New Hampshire Artist Image Size: 12 x 20 Frame Size: 18 x 26 Medium: Oil dated 2002 on canvas "Winter Geraniums" ...

Charlotte Curry TEXAS BLUEBONNET LANDSCAPE. Texas Artist Image Size: 18 x 24 Frame Size: 25 x 31 Medium: Oil on Canvas SIGNED "Springtime Afternoon" Charlotte Curry – Artist Biography Charlotte Curry is a predominantly landscape artist whose work captures the rugged beauty of the Southwest, with a special affinity for the Texas Hill Country Born in San Antonio, Texas, she developed a deep love for the region’s natural scenery during her formative years, often recalling Sunday family drives that inspired many of her paintings Training and Influences Curry’s artistic training includes extensive work with professional artists through the Cowboy Artists of America Museum, where she studied under William Moyers...

The Gargoyle and His Quarry, Notre Dame. 1920. Etching.Fletcher 90. 7 1/8 x 5 1/4 (sheet 10 1/2 x 9 1/16). Gargoyle series #1. Edition 75. A rich impression printed on 'FJHead&Co' c...

Dolly Parton taken in 1994 by acclaimed photographer, Timothy White in New York. Signed limited edition print, 11x14" image in 16x20" paper, edition size is 25. Recently printed (...

Willie Nelson, taken at the 4th July Picnic in 1979 in Austin Texas by photographer Scott Newton Signed limited edition print, printed on heavyweight cotton photo rag with a matte f...

Impressionistic oil painting of a bouquet of pink and white flowers. Hass, a late Impressionist painter of the Munch school, was known for his sensitivity of color perception and lig...

Signed limited edition print by Ed Caraeff of Dolly Parton taken during the cover session for her album ‘Heartbreaker’ on February 15, 1978 in Los Angeles, California. Framed 16x20...

Tranquil pasture watercolor scene with bright green fields and country homes by French artist R. Boutin, 1961. Signed lower right. Original artwork on paper displayed on a white m...

Lifetime prints are the last remaining prints available, signed by Terry O’Neill and obtained from the Terry O’Neill Archive in London. Signed limited edition, silver gelatin print ...

Robert Harrison (Born 1949) San Antonio Artist Image Size: 11 x 14 Frame Size: 16 x 20 Medium: Oil on Canvas "Bluebonnets" Biography Robert Harrison (Born 1949) Robert Harrison was b...

Donald S. Vogel has been a set designer and technical director in the theater, a fine art dealer, and a writer, but first and foremost he is a painter. From a young age he was intrig...

Robert Harrison (Born 1949) San Antonio Artist Image Size: 18 x 24 Frame Size: 24 x 30 Medium: Oil on Canvas Signed "Sea of Blue" Bluebonnets Biography Robert Harrison (Born 1949) Ro...

Ray Roberts (Born 1957) Southern California Artist Image Size: 12 x 16 Frame Size: 19 1/4 x 23 1/4 Medium: Oil ON BOARD SIGNED "Blooming California Poppies" California Landscape Ray Roberts(Born 1957) Born and raised in Southern California, Ray Roberts became a plein air* painter of desert and coastal landscapes. He earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree from the Art Center College of Design* in Pasadena. His first studio was in Scottsdale, Arizona, and in 1997, he and his artist wife, Peggi Kroll Roberts, and their three children moved to Angel's Camp, California to a small ranch. He is a regular instructor of painting at the Scottsdale Artists' School. In August, 2000, Roberts won Best of Show for his painting Curtis Creek at the American Impressionist Society's* show in Cincinnati, Ohio. Source: Southwest Art, October 2004 Ray Roberts is one of California's most respected Plein Air artists. He has recently won the Gold Medal for "Best Painting" at the California Art Club and the Artists' Choice Award, the highest accolade from fellow artists, at three major Southwest art events. Ray Roberts is best known for his seascapes, figurative work, and majestic views of California and the Southwest. Ray Roberts' vibrant use of color, bold textures, and sensitivity to shifting patterns of light give life and movement to his paintings. They are to be experienced, not merely observed. Inspired by such early California impressionists as Hanson Puthuff, William Wendt, and William Ritschel, Ray Roberts seeks to capture the luminous, golden light and the magnificent, vanishing landscapes of his native state. Like his other great hero, Maynard Dixon, Ray Roberts shares a reverence for the land and a marked spirituality in his work. Ray Roberts believes in the importance of artistic legacy. "There's a brotherhood of painters who came before me and who will come after. We speak in the past, present, and future. We talk about our experience and personality, our torments and exhilarations; we talk about the beauty of the fleeting light, time and of our family, friends and acquaintances." Born in 1954, Ray Roberts grew up in an Orange County with orange groves, before the days of freeways and sprawling housing developments. It has given him an enduring affection for the untamed, undeveloped California of his youth. One boyhood neighbor was painter Evelyn Nunn Miller, who would let Ray Roberts into her studio to retrieve the balls he'd hit over her fence. Later, after the early death of his father and mother's ill-health, Ray Roberts was sent to Orme School, a beautiful, ranch-style boarding school in the Arizona desert. Its strong fine arts program helped Ray Roberts to discover his artistic talent. He then attended the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, where he studied under John Asaro. He has also studied under Dan McCaw, Len Chmiel, and Mark Daily. Art Center is where Ray Roberts also met his wife, impressionist painter Peggi Kroll. While dating, the two of them would go out nightclubbing, to sketch rather than dance! It has been a successful partnership ever since. Like many successful artists before him, Ray Roberts first pursued a career as an illustrator, establishing a studio in Los Angeles and then Scottsdale, Arizona. He got up the courage to switch to fine art in 1992 and has never looked back. Ray and Peggi now live with their three children and assorted animals on a 20 acre ranch in Angel's Camp, an old California gold rush town, surrounded by the oak-studded hills which he frequently paints. The great outdoors is RayRoberts' studio. A bit of an adventurer, he's been known to backpack for several days into the wilderness, set up his easel on a cliff edge, or in the surf, for just the right setting. Awards and Affiliations Signature Member - Plein Air Painters of America (PAPA) Signature Member - California Art Club (CAC) Signature Member - Laguna Plein Air Painters Association (LPAPA) Signature Member - Northwest Rendezvous 2007 - Haggin Museum, Stockton 2007 - Santa Lucia Preserve, Invitational En Plein Air, Carmel, CA 2007 Exhibitor, Arizona: A Millennium of Arizona Art, Mark Sublette Medicine Man Gallery, Tucson, AZ 2004 Gold Medal for "Best Painting" at the California Art Club's 94th Annual Gold Medal Juried Exhibition, Pasadena Museum of California Art, Pasadena, California 2004 Artists' Choice Award- Laguna Plein Air Invitational Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Beach, California 2004 Artists' Choice Award- Maynard Dixon Country Invitational Mount Carmel, Utah 2003 Artists' Choice, Laguna Plein Air Invitational, Laguna, California 2003 Artists' Choice Award, Carmel Plein Air Festival, Carmel, California 2003 Honorable Mention, Carmel Plein Air Festival, Carmel, California 2003 Maynard Dixon Award, Sonoran Desert Invitational, Tucson, Arizona 2002 Honorable Mention, Laguna Plein Air Invitational, Laguna, California 2001 Honorable Mention, Scene on the Straight, Vallejo, California 2001 American Artist Magazine Award for Excellence, Oil Painters of America National Juried Show, Palm Desert, California 2000 Best of Show, American Impressionist Society, Cincinnati, Ohio 1999 Honorable Mention, Laguna Plein Air Invitational, Laguna, California 1999 Best Seascape, Ebell Club Annual Art Show, Los Angeles, California 1999 Artists' Choice Award, Carmel Plein Air Festival, Carmel, California 1995 Best of Show, Phippen Memorial Art Show, Prescott, Arizona 1995 First Place Oil, Phippen Memorial Art Show, Prescott, Arizona 1995 Best of Show, Beaver Creek Art...

Valley House Gallery is honored to present a selection of paintings from the estate of American artist, John Hartell (1902-1995). John Hartell taught two disciplines at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York: freshman architecture and graduate painting. He was a much-loved professor there from 1930 until his retirement in 1967; one of his most illustrious students is the architect Richard Meier. As an artist, Hartell's first solo exhibition was in 1937 at Kleeman Gallery in New York. He exhibited at Kraushaar Galleries in New York for four decades, beginning in 1943. The Hartell Gallery at Cornell University, under the Sibley Dome, is named for him. In describing John Hartell, the artist Michael Boyd...

French watercolor of brightly-colored fishing boats at dusk, 1979. Signed lower right. Original artwork on paper displayed on a white mat with a gold b...

Impressive watercolor landscape of a charming old world scene of a village in Provence, France by artist Augustin Faure, circa 1950. Original one-of-a-kind artwork on paper displa...

Portrait of singer and dancer, Kate Bush by acclaimed photographer, Gered Mankowitz, taken in his London studio in 1978. Kate Bush has seen a huge resurgence...

Anthony Bourdain drinks a beer in a New York bar during a photoshoot with photographer Jake Chessum in 2008. The photo is printed on Fuji crystal archive paper Available in the foll...

Dimensions listed are for each individual hand and the price is for the pair. Artist Biography: Artist and designer Pedro Friedeberg is known for his surrealist paintings, prints, a...

Harding Black (1912-2004) San Antonio Artist Image Size: 3 inches tall Frame Size: 10 1/2 inch diameter Medium: Art Pottery Ceramic Dated 1959 Mid Century Modern "Navy Blue Sgraffito Bowl...

Canvas Size: 29 x 24 in. Frame Size: 36.5 x 31 in. Signed, bottom leftt. In this mesmerizing portrait, Joaquín Torrents Lladó demonstrates the virtuoso brushwork and dramatic chiaro...

Early Texas Impressionist country landscape painting by Porfirio Salinas. The work features a small lake surrounded by trees as the sun sets in the background. Signed in the front lo...

G. Harvey (Gerald Harvey Jones) (1933-2017) San Antonio, Austin, and Fredericksburg Artist Image Size: 60 x 40 Frame Size: 71 x 51 Medium: Oil on Canvas Signed 1980 "The Blowout" Woo...

Robert Rauschenberg Autobiography, 1968 Three panel offset lithograph on three sheets of paper 66 1/4 x 48 3/4 inches each Ed. 2000, unsigned Unframed Can be displayed horizontally o...

The Venice Canals community is located in the Venice neighborhood of the City of Los Angeles, a few blocks from Venice Beach. The Venice Canals are located south of the City of Santa...

Magnificent landscape watercolor of a waterfall spilling over large river rocks by Alexandre René Véron (1826-1897), circa 1870. Signed lower right. Original one-of-a-kind antique w...

Realistic figurative portrait of an indigenous Native American man by American artist Kenneth Su. The work features a man dressed in traditional clothing with large rock formations i...

Abstract ink drawing by Spanish artist Jorge Miton, 2005. Signed lower right. Original artwork on paper displayed on a white mat with a gold border. Archival plastic sleeve and Ce...

The Who under a Union Jack flag, 1968 by Art Kane Shot in 1968 in NYC in Morningside Park near Columbia University, Art Kane had plenty of fun with The Who. Kane described them as “...

Oil on board Board Size: 16 x 20 in. Frame Size: 22 x 26.5 in. Signed, bottom right. In this oil painting Jose Vives-Atsara captures the rugged, sun-drenched essence of the Spanish ...

William Ballantine Dorsey (1942-2019) California Artist Image Size: 16 x 20 Frame Size: 23.5 x 27.5 Medium: Oil on Canvas "California Landscape"

Portrait of singer and dancer, Kate Bush by acclaimed photographer, Gered Mankowitz, taken in his London studio in 1978 for the cover of her album, Lionheart. Gered recalls, "The cover series of portraits that I shot for Lionheart in August 1978. I art directed the album cover and my assistant at the time, Richard Grey...

Portrait of Albert Schweitzer. Etching. 11 3/4 x 9 3/4 (sheet 16 1/4 x 14). Illustrated: Beall, American Prints in the Library of Congress, page 205....

Edward Bohlin Saddle (1895-1980) Hollywood, California Artist / Saddle Maker One of Montie Montana's personal Bohlin Saddles. Movie Star, Trick Rider, Trick Roper Signed. Leather & Sterling Silver #4 "Montie Montana's" Personal Bohlin Parade Saddle Circa Late 1930s - Early 1940s. It is all Bohlin made and marked to include the saddle, the headstall and the breast collar. All made in Hollywood California. Montie Montana (born Owen Harlen Mickel; June 21, 1910 – May 20, 1998) was a rodeo trick rider and trick roper, actor, stuntman and cowboy inducted into the Pro Rodeo Hall of fame in 1994 Biography Montana was born in Wolf Point, Montana, in 1910. He was a perennial participant in the Tournament of Roses Parade until his death in Los Angeles, California, in 1998. Television viewers know him from more than 60 appearances, waving to the crowd from his silver saddle. During the first inauguration of Dwight D. Eisenhower as the 34th President of the United States on January 20, 1953, Montana lassoed the president after his swearing-in. He can be seen as a contestant on the May 7, 1959 television broadcast of You Bet Your Life, along with his horse Rex.Montana would go to elementary schools and perform with Rex. He was at Camellia Avenue Elementary School in North Hollywood, California, in 1959, and he would talk about the rubber horseshoes Rex would be fitted with so Rex would not slip on the asphalt playground while Montie was riding Rex. He performed rope tricks on and off of Rex, and would pass out photos of him and Rex to the students at the end of his show. In 1996, a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs, California, Walk of Stars was dedicated to him. He was buried at the Oakwood Memorial Park in Chatsworth, California Filmography Year Title Role Notes 1932 The Saddle Buster Rodeo Performer Uncredited 1934 Stand Up And Cheer! Rope Spinner Uncredited 1935 The Circle of Death Little Buffalo, alias Jim Little 1935 Border Vengeance Montie Montana, Trick Rider Uncredited 1935 Melody Trail Rodeo Rider Uncredited 1936 Comin’ Round the Mountain Roper Uncredited 1936 Gun Smoke 1939 The Kid from Texas Trick Rider Uncredited 1943 Riders of the Deadline Ranger Kelton 1944 Take it Big Show Performer Uncredited 1944 Man from Frisco Montana Uncredited 1949 Down Dakota Way Sheriff Holbrook 1952 The Story of Will Rogers Trick Roping Double for Will Rogers Jr. Uncredited 1954 The Boy from Oklahoma Roper Uncredited 1960 The Rifleman Stage Driver 1962 The Man who shot Liberty Valence Cowboy on Pinto Pony Uncredited 1963 Hud Cowboy Uncredited 1964 Cheyene Autumn Trooper Uncredited 1968 Arizona Bushwackers Stage Driver 1972 The Young Rounders (final film role) Honors 1989 Rodeo Hall of Fame of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum 1990 Pendleton Round-Up and Happy Canyon Hall of Fame 1994 Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame 1997 Ellensburg Rodeo Hall of Fame 2011 Cheyenne Frontier Days Hall of Fame 2015 Montana Cowboy Hall of Fame & Western Heritage THE BOHLIN BRAND IS AS ICONIC AS THE FAMED WESTERN STARS that wore it. The late actor Richard Farnsworth sported a recognizable gold steer-head Bohlin buckle...

Signed limited edition print from acclaimed photographer, Jim Herrington of Dolly Parton taken in Tennessee, 2001 Archival pigment print on Hahnemuhle Baryta 315 gsm, acid-free, 100...

Archival Pigment Print Image size: 12.8 x 18 in. Paper size: 17 x 22 in. Signed and titled in pencil on print verso Michael O’Brien is one of the country’s premier portrait photogra...

Robert Wood (G. Day) (1889 -1979) San Antonio Artist Image Size: 20 x 24 Frame Size: 29 x 33 Medium: Oil Signed Lower left "Bluebonnet" Biography Robert Wood (G. Day) (1889 -1979) A painter of realistic landscapes reflecting a vanishing wilderness in America, Robert Wood (not to be confused with Robert E. Wood) is reportedly one of the most mass-produced artists in the United States. His painting became so popular he was unable to meet all of the demands, and many of his works were reproduced in lithographs and mass distributed as prints, place mats, and wall murals by companies including Sears, Roebuck. He was born in Sandgate, Kent on the south coast of England near Dover, the son of W.L. Wood, a famous home and church painter who recognized and supported his son's talent. In fact, he forced his son to paint by keeping him inside to paint rather than playing with his friends. At age 12, Wood entered the South Kensington School of Art. As a youth, he came to the United States in 1910, having served in the Royal Army, and he never returned to England. He traveled extensively all over the United States, especially in the West, often in freight cars, and also painted in Mexico and Canada. His itinerant existence took him to Illinois where he worked as a farmhand, to Pensacola, Florida where he married, briefly in Ohio, Seattle, Washington, and Portland, Oregon. In 1912, he was in Los Angeles, and in the late 1920s and early 1930s, in San Antonio, Texas, where he lived and in 1928 exhibited in the "Texas Wildflower Competition." From San Antonio, he gained a national reputation for his strong colored, dramatic paintings. Some of that prestige has been credited to his association with Jose Arpa, prominent Texas artist. Wood also gave art lessons, and one of his students was Porfirio Salinas. During this period, Wood sometimes signed his paintings G. Day or Trebor, which is Robert spelled backwards. In 1941 he went to California and painted numerous desert and mountain landscapes and coastal scenes. He lived in Carmel for seven years, and then moved to Woodstock, New York, but he soon returned to California, settling first in Laguna Beach, then San Diego, and finally in the High Sierras, where he and his wife built a home and studio near Bishop and lived until his death in 1979. Robert Wood was born March 4, 1889, in Sandgate, England, a small town on the Kentish coast not far from the white cliffs of Dover. His father, W. J. Wood, was a successful painter who recognized Robert's unusual talent. At the age of twelve, his father enrolled Wood in art school in the small town of Folkstone. He then attended the South Kensington School of Art. While attending art school, Wood won four first awards and three second awards, one each year, a record. In 1910 after service in the Royal Army, nineteen-year-old Wood and his friend, Claude Waters, immigrated to America. Initially, he settled in Illinois and worked as a hired hand on a farm belonging to Water's uncle. He would then strike out on his own, living the life of an itinerant painter. Wood traveled as a hobo, hopping freight trains and selling or bartering small paintings to support him along the way. When times were hard, he worked at whatever job was available. In this manner, he saw most of the United States and fell in love with rural America. By 1912, Wood visited Los Angeles for the first time, arriving on the day of the Titanic tragedy. Later that year, he had met, courted and married young Eyssel Del Wagoner in Florida. The couple moved to Ohio where a daughter, Florence, was born. During World War I, the family moved to Seattle where a son, John Robert Wood, was born in 1919. In the early 1920's, the young Wood family was almost constantly on the move. They stayed for short periods in Kansas, Missouri, California and for a longer time in Portland, Oregon, where Wood's friend Claude Waters had settled. Wood's seemingly endless wanderings disrupted his family life and delayed his development as a painter. However, through his travels he developed an appreciation for the American landscape that would inspire him for the rest of his career. Although aware of the current movement away from traditional realism in American art, he elected to travel that solitary path and remain true to his own vision of American’s grandeur and beauty poetically translated through his landscape and seascape paintings. In 1923, the Wood family discovered the beautiful city of San Antonio, Texas and it was there that he and his family would finally settle. He studied briefly at the San Antonio Art School with Spanish colorist Jose Arpa y Perea (1860-1952), who had arrived in San Antonio that same year. In the latter part of the 1920’s, Jose Arpa’s influence quickly became evident. Wood after several years of experimentation was becoming fine easel painter, capable of great subtlety with a new mature original style. Like Texas painters Robert Onderdonk (1853-1917) and his son Julian Onderdonk (1882-1922), Robert Wood concentrated on the distinctive Texas landscape with its Red Oak trees and wildflowers that covered the hill country landscape. He developed a reputation for his scenes of Blue Bluebonnets, the state flower. In the spring, the Texas prairie is covered with wildflowers, especially in the hill country surrounding San Antonio and Austin. Wood incorporated native stone barns and rough wood farmhouses that added authenticity and romance to his compositions. In 1925, Wood was divorced from his wife. In 1932, he moved to the famous scenic loop on San Antonio's outskirts. While still living in Texas, he took extensive western sketching trips that brought him to California. It is evident that his 1930’s California...

Signed limited edition print of John Lennon and Yoko Ono during the filming of a video to promote their new album, "Double Fantasy", New York City, November 26, 1980, taken by Allen Tannenbaum. Filming began in Central Park, then moved to a gallery on SoHo for scenes where they would arrive in a white bedroom, first in street clothes and later in kimonos, strip, and make love. Allan Tannenbaum is an esteemed photojournalist and fine art photographer. His documentation of New York art, music, and nightlife has become iconic, particularly his definitive coverage of the burgeoning 1970s punk...

Shown are paintings by the Realist Society of Houston. They are a group of realist artists in the Houston area who find inspiration from learning about art and art history. We also...

Ross Stefan (1934-1999) Arizona / Wisconsin Artist Image Size: 7.5 x 6.5 Frame Size: 18 x 16 Medium: Oil "Pueblo" Biography Ross Stefan (1934-1999) Born in...

Colorful abstract cowboy portrait painting by contemporary artist Ian Francis. The work features a western inspired figure with a shadowed face dressed in a blue shirt and cowboy hat...

Hanging by a String by Gary Hernandez is painted in the style of American Realism. Pear on a Red String has a custom archival frame. Oil on Panel 14 x 11 What is the significance ...

The Rolling Stones "Mick Feeding Goat" - Outtake from the famous photo shoot of The Rolling Stones for their Beggars Banquet album at Sarum Chase mansion, Hampstead, London, 1968, si...

Signed limited edition 20x24" print of Dolly Parton taken in New York City in 1977 by Allan Tannenbaum. Edition number 5/25 Allan Tannenbaum prints are available in the following ...

Abstract painting accented in bright hues of red, blue and a soft lavender by French artist AM Vivent, 1986. Signed and dated lower right. Original artwork on paper displayed on a ...

Signed limited edition archival print of Country music star Dolly Parton hugging John Belushi backstage after her Bottom Line concert. NYC 5/14/77 by SoH...

The Rolling Stones, Tangerine Bowl, Orlando, Florida 1981 Signed limited edition photographic print by Blaise Hayward from his series “Tickets Please” These editioned digital pigme...

Lester Hughes (1938-2021) El Paso Artist Image Size: 24 x 36 Frame Size: 31 x 43 Medium: Oil on Canvas. Signed "River Valley Roundup" Biography Lester Hughes (1938-2021) From El Paso...

Porfirio Salinas (1910-1973) San Antonio Artist Image Size: 30 x 40 Frame Size: 39 x 49 Medium: Oil on Canvas Dated 1957 "Bluebonnet Creek" Texas Hill Country Biography Porfirio Salinas (1910-1973) Porfirio Salinas was a self-taught artist who painted landscapes of Central Texas with an emphasis on the vast bluebonnet fields that grow there in the springtime. Born in 1910 in Bastrop, Texas, he attended public schools in San Antonio. He also observed works in progress by the director of the San Antonio Art School, Jose Arpa, as well as landscape painter, Robert Wood. Wood is said to have paid Salinas five dollars a picture to paint bluebonnets because "he hated to paint bluebonnets". Salinas served in the military from 1943 to 1945. Although he was assigned to Fort Sam Houston, he was allowed to live at home. At the fort, Colonel Telesphor Gottchalk assigned him to paint murals for the officer's lounge and various other projects, and Salinas continued to be able to paint during his entire conscripted period. Even before he achieved notoriety among galleries, dealers, and museums, Salinas was widely followed and appreciated by many Texans, including former President Lyndon B. Johnson, who may be considered responsible for launching Salinas popularity beyond the boundaries of Texas. In 1973, Texas capital, Austin, honored Salinas for having "done much to bring the culture of Mexico and Texas closer together with his paintings". Salinas died in April 1973 in San Antonio, Texas. From the years of the Great Depression through President Lyndon Johnson's Great Society of the 1960s, Texan Porfirio Salinas (1910-1973) remained one of the Lone Star State's most popular artists. Today, his works remain popular with Texas collectors and those who love landscapes of the beautiful "Hill Country" that lies in the center of the state. One of the first Mexican American painters to become widely recognized for his art, Salinas was a favorite of President Lyndon Johnson and his wife, Lady Bird Johnson, as well as of Sam Rayburn, the longest-serving Speaker of the House of Representatives, and Texas Governor John Connelly. In fact, President Johnson was so enamored with his Salinas paintings that the artist will forever be associated with America's first Texas-born President. Works by Porfirio Salinas are in a number of museum collections, grace the halls of the Texas State Capitol and the Governor's Mansion in Austin, and are included in virtually every major private collection of Early Texas Art. Porfirio Salinas was born on November 6, 1910, near the small town of Bastrop, Texas, about thirty miles from Austin. His father, Porfirio G. Salinas (1881-1967), and his mother, Clara G. Chavez, struggled to make a hardscrabble living as tenant farmers, but eventually were forced to give up farming. The family moved to San Antonio, where Salinas' father was able to get a job working as a laborer for the railroad, but the scenic area around Bastrop, with its pine trees and the wide expanse of the Rio Grande River, would forever remain a touchstone for the artist. For the rest of his life, Salinas and his brothers went back frequently to visit their grandmother in her little farmhouse. When in Bastrop, Porfirio painted on the banks of the Rio Grande or in the groves of pine trees. The Salinas family was close-knit and Porfirio was the middle child of five children, so he had an older brother and sister as well as a younger brother and sister. His mother was a native of Mexico, so throughout his childhood the family made the long drive to Mexico to visit Clara Salinas' family. As a child growing up in the bi-lingual section of San Antonio, Salinas drew and painted incessantly and by the time he was ten, he was already producing work that was mature enough to sell to his schoolteachers. Many years later in an article in the New York Times he was described as a "boy whose textbooks were seldom opened and whose sketchbook was never closed." Instead of studying, the young artist spent his spare time watching artists paint in and around San Antonio. As an aspiring painter, Salinas was fortunate to grow up in the historic city, which had the most active art scene in Texas. It was his exposure to older, professional painters that encouraged the precocious young painter to leave school early in order to help his family and pursue a career as a professional artist, despite his father's inability to see art as a career with any future for his son. When Salinas was about fifteen he came to know the artist Robert W. Wood (1889-1979). He met Wood while he was employed in an art supply store and he soon began to work as an assistant to the English-born painter, who had moved from Portland to San Antonio in 1924. Although the diminutive Englishman was already an established professional artist, he did not have a great deal of formal art training and so he was then studying with the academically trained Spanish painter Jose Arpa (1858-1952) in order to augment his knowledge and give his work a more polished look. Salinas was an eager young man, and while working in Wood's downtown San Antonio studio he learned to stretch canvases, frame paintings and to sketch in larger compositions from small plein-air studies for the English artist. He began to accompany Wood and Arpa to the hills outside San Antonio, where they painted small Plein-air studies of fields of blue lupin - the state flower, the famous "Bluebonnets" of Texas - in the springtime and scenes of the gnarled Red Oaks as they changed color in the fall. He was soon assisting Wood in the tedious work of painting the tiny blue flowers that collectors wanted to see in the landscapes they purchased of central Texas. According to a 1972 newspaper story, "Legend has it that one day in the 1920s artist Robert Wood decided he could not bear to paint another bluebonnet in one of his landscapes. He hired young Porfirio Salinas to paint them in for him at five dollars a painting." Whether this story is accurate or apocryphal isn't clear, but the ambitious and independent young Salinas wasn't destined to be anyone's assistant for very long. The formative event of Porfirio Salinas' teenage years was the Texas Wildflower Competitive Exhibitions, a Roaring-Twenties dream of the eccentric oilman Edgar B. Davis (1873-1951). These competitive shows of paintings of wildflowers and Texas life were mounted in San Antonio from 1927 to 1929. Held at the newly opened Witte Museum each spring, the exhibition featured large cash prizes donated by the philanthropic Davis, which were an inducement for artists to travel from all over the United States to paint in the Hill Country of Texas. The "Davis Competitions," as they were known, helped to cement San Antonio's reputation as an art center, a legacy that remains with the "River City" today. The shows generated a great deal of excitement in the area, helping to make celebrities of the some of the artists who had already settled there and encouraging others to make San Antonio their home. Over the three years that the wildflower competitions were held, more than 300 paintings were exhibited, and many thousands of viewers saw the paintings at the Witte Museum and on tours throughout the state and in New York. Each year Davis would generously purchase the winning paintings and then donate them to the San Antonio Art League. Young Porfirio Salinas would have been able to not only watch his two mentors - Robert W. Wood and Jose Arpa - paint the works that they entered in the Davis Competitions, he would have been able to see Arpa take several of the major prizes, receiving the judge's accolades for "Verbena," "Cactus Flower" and "Picking Cotton," works that are still on view at the San Antonio Art League Museum today. Unfortunately, Davis eventually put his donations to work in other charitable endeavors, bringing to an end the wildflower events, but only after they inspired Salinas and other young painters and had helped to make wildflower paintings the most sought-after subject for traditionalist Texas collectors. In 1930, when he was only twenty, Salinas hung out a shingle and began to paint professionally, augmenting the sales of his easel paintings with what little business he could garner by painting signs for local concerns. It was a struggle for the young artist to make a living, as the effects of the Great Depression were settling in. His early works are very similar to those of Robert Wood's, both in subject matter and treatment. Salinas did small paintings of Bluebonnets for the tourists who visited San Antonio to see the famous Alamo as well as paintings of the Texas missions...