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Taos Painters: Oscar Edmund Berninghaus (1874-1952)
When Oscar Berninghaus succumbed to the effects of a crippling heart attack on April 27, 1952, a certain period of Southwestern Art effectively ended with him. One of the leading figures of the Taos Society of Artists and an artist whose success was hard-won, his passing represented the beginning of the end for the original painters of Taos and New Mexico. At 77, he was one of the elder statesmen of the New Mexico art community, whose body of work, in the words of artist Rebecca James, was
Oeberninghaus.net ~
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Taos Painters: Ace Powell (1912 - 1978)
Ace Powell was a prolific painter, etcher, and sculptor of Indian, cowboy, and horse imagery in the tradition of Charles Russell.
Powell was born in Tularosa, New Mexico but grew up in Apgar, Montana where his father worked as a wrangler, packer, and guide at Glacier National Park. He attended high school on the Blackfeet reservation in Browning before enrolling at Montana State University. In his early twenties, Powell worked as a wrangler on the Bar X6 ranch out of Babb, Montana, managing horses for the Glacier Park concessionaire.
As a youngster, Powell became acquainted with Charles M. Russell whose summer home, Bull Head Lodge, was located in Apgar. Encouraged by Russell and his protégé, Joe de Young, he took a few private art lessons, but most of his early training came through trial and error and observing the work of other artists. He worked hard at developing his painting and sculpting skills, but he apparently did not make much of a living from his art until the late 1930s, when he built a studio in Choteau, Montana.
After Powell's first wife died in 1941, he joined the Army, worked in a defense plant, and sold plastic figurines. In 1952 he enrolled briefly at the University of Montana on the GI Bill but disliked the academy's move toward abstraction, so he dropped out and took the Famous Artists School correspondence course. That same year, he married a fellow artist, Nancy McLaughlin, and the couple settled in Hungry Horse, Montana (just south of his boyhood home) where he operated a studio/gallery. After the studio burned in 1964, Powell divorced again. He married Thelma Conner the next year and the couple moved to Kalispell, Montana.
During the 1970s, Powell tried to promote Kalispell as an artists' colony. His studio always was open to both aspiring and established artists, and he gave an early boost to well-known Montana painters such as Fred Fellows, Bud Helbig, and Joe Abbrescia. Powell's son, Dave, is a painter working in the style of his father and is a member of the Cowboy Artists of America.
Powell is thought to have created 12,000 to 15,000 artworks over the course of his life. He felt he was most successful working in oil, but he also produced watercolors and etchings in addition to sculptures in bronze, terra cotta, and wood. In 1965 Powell wrote and illustrated a book of recollections and anecdotes entitled The Ace of Diamonds, an image of which served as his logo throughout his artistic career.
Acepowell.com ~
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Taos Painters: Cornelius Botke (1887-1954)
Cornelis Botke was born in Leewarden, Holland in 1887. He studied at the School of Applied Design in Haarlem before emigrating the United States in 1906, settling in Chicago. There, he married Jesse Arms, a painter and muralist.
Cornelis Botke Grand Canyon oil painting
Cornelis Botke, Grand Canyon, Oil on Canvas, 11
Corneliusbotke.com ~
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Taos Painters: Walter Ufer (1876-1936)
Walter Ufer grew up in Louisville, Kentucky, the son of a master gunsmith. His artistic endeavors received strong support from his parents and teachers and, after an apprenticeship in the printing plant of a Louisville commercial lithographer, Ufer traveled to Dresden, Germany to study at the Royal Applied Art Schools and the Royal Academy. After seven years spent abroad, during which he met J.H. Sharp and Ernest Blumenschein, Ufer moved to Chicago, where he find a powerful benefactor in Carter Harrison, the mayor. Harrison, along with his friend and partner, the meat-packing tycoon Oscar Mayer, sent Ufer south to Taos on a painting trip in 1914.
Walter Ufer Oil Painting Desert Mountain
Walter Ufer, Desert Mountain, Oil on Canvas, 25
Walterufer.net ~
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Taos Painters: Bert Geer Phillips (1868-1956)
Bert Geer Phillips was born in Hudson, New York and trained in fine art at the Art Students League in New York City. He was a dedicated artist even as a young man, and constantly sought out new instructors and material in order to hone his talents as a academic realist. He studied at the Julian Academy in Paris, where he met Ernest Blumenschein and J.H. Sharp. Sharp spoke passionately about the landscape and peoples of the New Mexico pueblos, urging the two younger artists to travel to the southwest in order to find natural inspiration for their art.
Bert Geer Phillips Oil on Canvas Corpus Christi Sunday in Taos
Bert Geer Phillips, Corpus Christi Sunday in Taos, Oil on Canvas Board, 12.5
Bertphillips.com ~
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Taos Painters: Byron Wolfe (1904 - 1973)
Wolfe was born in Parsons, Kansas and worked on a ranch as a youth. After studying art at the University of Kansas he worked for an engraving company and as a freelance illustrator. Among his commissions were western scenes for the Goetz Brewing Company and for the American Royal Livestock and Horse Show. He later took a job as art director for a Kansas City advertising agency.
Byron Wolfe Mirror Talk - Between Cheyenne War Parties watercolor painting
Byron Wolfe, Mirror Talk - Between Cheyenne War Parties, watercolor, c. 1960, 16
Byronwolfepaintings.com ~
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