Cowboy Up! – Western Oil Painting Series
Western art, to me, is an outlet for dynamic expression and energetic gestural painting. I never claimed to be a cowboy, but I’ve enjoyed creating fine art images from the spectacle of rodeo. It’s an excuse to depict powerful animals in violent motion and for studying the whirling forces of man and beast working in harmony or in contest to achieve mutual or opposing goals! In my mini “series” of articles on painting in a series, this is the latest installment. There are more than these paintings alone in my western series, but I wanted to share these as a sampling.
The Ride was the painting which kicked off (so to speak) my interest in painting these scenes. The rapid brush strokes denote the motion of the bull, while I enjoyed adding more detail to his face, horns, and hooves which are not only important parts of the composition, but also the areas which are most stationary at the moment depicted.
As mentioned in the caption about American Bullfight on my website, much of its composition was inspired by El Jaleo, the classic masterpiece by John Singer Sargent. More about him later.
American Bullfight and The Champion were created in short succession and, along with the other western pieces, represent a connection of both style and content which ties this series together. The Champion seems to have garnered a great deal of attention wherever it’s been displayed. I think it may be, in part, because of the action and also the subtle details of pose, musculature, and texture which are still perceptible even in the blur of motion.