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Taos Painters: Lucy Clare Drake Marlow (1890 - 1978)
Born in Erie, PA, Marlow received her art training in New York at the Art Students League and at the Carnegie Institute. Further studies were at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art in Pittsburgh and with George Elmer Browne and Ernest L. Blumenschein. She also traveled to Italy for study. She continued her studies in Provincetown and established herself as an academic figure and portrait painter in the Pittsburgh area, fulfilling painting commissions and teaching art classes in the 1920's. In 1927 Marlow moved to Tucson because of the frail health of her daughter. In Tucson she became associated with the Tucson Fine Arts Association. She was a member of the Hoosier Salon, Pittsburgh Art Association, and the Tucson Fine Arts Association. She exhibited at the Carnegie Institute, Phoenix Art Center, Hoosier Salon and Pittsburgh Art Association.
Lucydrakemarlow.com ~
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Taos Painters: Bror Julius Olsson Nordfeldt (1878 - 1955)
Bror Julius Nordfeldt was a Swedish immigrant to the United States who moved to Chicago as a fourteen year-old boy. There, he worked as a typesetter at a Swedish-language newspaper, where his superiors noticed his artistic talent and urged him to pursue a career in art. To that end, Nordfeldt enrolled in the Chicago Art Institute in 1899 and began studying etching, engraving, drawing and painting. He developed quickly, and moved into the 57th Street Artists Colony. A prominent local mural painter, Albert Herter, eventually hired the young Nordfeldt to assist him with his latest project: a commission from the McCormick Harvester Company to paint their entry in the Paris Exhibit of 1900. Nordfeldt accompanied the piece to Paris when it was shipped and installed, and ended up staying in Europe for three years.
Nordfeldt's time in Europe was primarily in Paris, where he studied at the Academie Julian with Jean Paul Laurens. He was heavily influenced in his time there by the work of Manet, Gauguin and Cezanne, and a Fauvist influence became quite apparent in his work. He had an opportunity to study woodblock cutting in London, and displayed work at the Royal Academy of London. The experience was eye-opening, and the style that resulted didn't sit well with some American audiences upon his return. America was still very much enamored of the academic realist style that had sustained painting since the renaissance, and Nordfeldt's embellishments of color and form were not appreciated by some. He had two shows in Chicago in 1907, one of which was academic in style and one of which was more closely Fauvist. The latter show caused much consternation amongst those in attendance, though it received positive write-ups in the city press.
Nordfeldt was getting close to the style that would define much of his later work, but the outbreak of the First World War brought him to California, where he painted boat camouflage, and Europe, where he served in combat units. Military service was a great distraction from a career that seemed to be emerging from obscurity, as Nordfeldt had just won a silver medal in etching at the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition.
Upon returning to the U.S. in 1917, Nordfeldt moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he painted jazzy, motion-filled palettes of Indian figures and ceremonies, as well as untraditional portraits and still lifes. His pieces were, conceptually, a step further towards modernism than the material being produced by most New Mexico artists of the day. He was deeply involved not only in documenting Pueblo Indian tribes, but in attempting to preserve them. He helped found the Indian Artists Fund, which attempted to foster and preserve the arts of the Pueblo.
Bjonordfeldtpaintings.com ~
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Taos Painters: Ralph Waldo Emerson Meyers (1885-1948)
Ralph Meyers spent his childhood in Denver, Colorado and moved to Taos in 1909 to take a job as a fire guard. This move was the beginning of a path that was to shape the rest of his life.
He began traveling to and trading with the Taos Indians in the pueblo and surrounding area and opened a trading post in 1912. Meyers was one of few white men who became well known and trusted by the Native Americans. Through taking many photos and teaching himself how to paint, Ralph began to document the dramatic landscapes and the interesting culture of the native people he grew to love. His first exhibition was for the Museum of New Mexico in 1917. The Russian artist Leon Gaspard considered Meyers to be one of the finest colorists of the period.
Out of his great respect for the native traditions, Ralph learned how to create beadwork, deerskin clothing and ceremonial pieces. He also taught himself silversmith skills and eventually trained and employed Navajo and Taos Indians to make jewelry and crafts for the growing tourist trade. Millicent Rogers, Mabel Dodge Luhan and Queen Marie of Romania were some of his customers and friends.
He began making reproductions of Spanish-Colonial furniture and filled large commissioned orders for clients such as the one for oilman Waite Phillips for the Philmont Ranch in Cimarron and the Philbrook Estate in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He supplied German author Karl May items for his museum collection and study in Radebeul, Germany.
In 1933, Ralph married Rowena Matteson. The couple ran the trading post together and opened a restaurant called La Dona Luz which they operated until Ralph passed away in 1948. They had a daughter named Nina who currently oversees the trading post (now called El Rincon) and a son named Ouray, after Chief Ouray of the Uncompahgre Utes. Ralph became the subject of his friend Frank Waters' book called The Man Who Killed the Deer, which was about an Indian trader in the early days of Taos.
Meyers work is in many museums including the Hubbell Trading Post National Historic Site and the Smithsonian Institute.
Ralphwaldoemersonmeyers.com ~
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