26 Almanac 2014–2015

Corrida de la Sandía aka Dia De San Juan (The Watermelon Race) by Jean Louis Théodore Gentilz, 1848, oil on canvas. Texas History Captured by Artists Enamored with the Land and Its People

By J.P. Bryan (1898–1994), Florence McClung (1894–1992), and Jamie Christy, PhD and Lloyd Goff (1917–1982) created unforget- table works in Texas. All brought to the place exas inspired some of the world’s the talent their profession demanded, but the finest artists. Their works, themati- land, the animals, and the people they beheld cally and stylistically varied and there provided them with profound inspiration T accomplished in a wide range of for the task at hand. mediums, capture the majesty and wonder of the American West in a vivid and diverse Not all of the artists who shaped their display that move the intellect and emotions of works with things Texan were born or died in the viewer. the state; but for a time most called it home, Artists such as Jean Louis Théodore Gentilz and for the remainder of their lives it remained (1819–1906), José Arpa y Perea (1858–1952), a place where their hearts lingered. French, Porfirio Salinas Jr. (1910–1973), Dawson Spanish, English, and German artists, among so Dawson-Watson (1864–1939), Robert Jenkins many others, became Texans by either choice Onderdonk (1852–1917), his son Robert or chance, and a large body of their work bears Julian Onderdonk (1882–1922), Karl Friedrich visual testimony to their enduring affection for Hermann Lungkwitz (1813–1891), Friedrich the region. Richard Petri (1824–1857), Charles “Frank” Many of Texas’s early artists flocked to Reaugh (1860–1945), Elisabet Ney (1833– , which stood for years as the 1907), Stephen Seymour Thomas (1868–1956), last settlement before the endless expanse of Tom Lea (1907–2001), unforgiving frontier. Born in , History 27

France, Théodore Gentilz came to Texas in for Texas that led him to teach at St. 1844, to serve as a surveyor for Henri Castro’s Mary’s College in San Antonio for many years. colony after studying at the L’École Impériale The Spaniard José Arpa, another well- de Mathématique et de Dessin (The Imperial known European painter who lived in San School of Mathematics and Drawing). Despite Antonio for a time, expertly depicted the light his inclusion in Paris’s sophisticated inner and shadows of Texas in its bluebonnet-clad circle of artists and intellectuals, he painted landscapes as well as on the worn faces of its what he observed in the rugged Southwest inhabitants. His A Laborer (San Antonio, 1903) exactly as he saw it: the San Antonio missions, is a haunting Christ-like depiction of a lined, Mexican ranchers and cowboys riding through haggard local worker. town, village dances, street scenes, and the Arpa’s Texas art is timeless, but he made indigenous population. another important contribution as director of his Gentilz’s canvases captured old Tejano own art school in San Antonio, giving classes social and cultural heritage in works such as there, as well as outdoor instruction in the Corrida de la Sandía (San Antonio, 1848) hills of Bandera and serving as an inspiration and historically important events such as the for other would-be artists, such as the largely Battle of the Alamo. Although Gentilz painted self-taught Central-Texas landscapist, Porfirio with the technical precision of an engineer Salinas, who watched him sketch on the streets draftsman, his pieces also express the passion and in the fields of San Antonio. British born Daw- son Dawson-Watson, a landscape artist who could rival Van Gogh in terms of Post-Impressionist style, also chose Texas for a large body of his work. A child prodigy, the Royal Acad- emy in London accepted his painting at the age of sixteen, and he became one of the original members of the famous Impressionist colony in Giverny, . Rather than the French countryside, the majority of his canvases captured the rugged terrain of the Hill Country and semi- arid Texas cacti in delicate colors in such as Cotton Pickers (1927) and Flowers of Silk (1928). After living on three conti- nents, Dawson-Watson set up a permanent studio in San Antonio in 1927 and remained there until his death. Maryland native Rob- ert Jenkins Onderdonk

A Laborer by José Arpa y Perea, 1903, oil on canvas. 28 Texas Almanac 2014–2015

Cotton Pickers by Dawson Dawson-Watson, 1927, oil on canvas. and his son, Robert Julian Onderdonk, found der of his life. His brother-in-law, Richard themselves drawn to the area as well, discover- Petri, drawn to the region’s German settlers ing the beauty of the bluebonnets in the Texas and Native Americans, rendered them in the Hill Country and painting them with dramatic midst of their daily lives. Petri’s Portrait of light, dark colors, and breathtaking preci- Susanna Queisser (1850) is a soulful, delicate sion. Perhaps the most interesting of Robert representation of a German child. Jenkins Onderdonk’s works, Market Plaza (San Another German, sculptor Elisabet Ney, Antonio, 1880) portrays the colorful hustle and well known for her strong statues of Stephen bustle and lively faces of San Antonio’s Market Austin and Sam displayed in the Square. Capitol building in Austin, as well as for the Prussian and German artists also gathered likeness of Texas’s Confederate general Albert in Texas. Hermann Lungkwitz, painter and Sidney Johnston in the State Cemetery, estab- photographer, immigrated to the lished a studio in that city in the early 1890s. in 1850 and settled in the Texas Hill Country. Ney explained the move across the Atlantic In that region, he rendered the hard, rocky ter- saying she had spent her early years capturing rain in locations such as the Pedernales River, the great men of Europe and she had decided to combining the fine-line drawing and exactness go to Texas and sculpt the wild men there. of a photographer with the flair of a Romanti- At her studio in Austin, named Formosa, cist. His favorite subjects were Bear Mountain, she created incredible plaster and marble Enchanted Rock, and the Guadalupe, Ped- tributes to Texan revolutionaries and statesmen, ernales, Llano, and Colorado rivers, and his as well as majestic and imposing statues of portrayal of these places contain unforgettably mythical characters, such as Lady Macbeth and luminous rocks and bright, earthy greens and Prometheus. Fully embodying the Texan spirit blues. of independence and uniqueness, Ney refused Lungkwitz remained in Texas, teaching art, to take her husband’s name when they married, mostly in Austin and Galveston, for the remain- wore pants instead of skirts and dresses, and History 29 rode her horse astride in- was deeply connected. stead of side-saddle. She French, Spanish, Reaugh imparted remains one of Texas’s his love of Texas and most remarkable artists. English, and German proved an incredibly No discussion of gifted teacher to many Texas art would be com- artists, among so many students in the area. He plete without inclusion others, became Texans by set up a studio in Oak of Frank Reaugh, who Cliff (near ) and, travelled from to either choice or chance, and by the mid-1890s had Texas with his family in a core group of serious a covered wagon at the a large body of their work students, known as the age of sixteen. bears visual testimony to “Dallas Nine,” who The Reaughs settled would remain with him in Terrell, near present- their enduring affection for the better part of day Dallas, in 1876, his life and became re- among one of the most for the region. nowned artists in their recognizable symbols of own right. Texas: the longhorn steer. Each year for nearly Reaugh, known affectionately as the “Rem- four decades, Reaugh loaded supplies and brandt of the Longhorn,” found inspiration in students into his custom-outfitted Model T the giant animals’ sturdiness, their ability to Ford and drove into the wilderness of the Texas adapt to the harshness of the Texas terrain, and plains and mountains, with a special interest in in their beauty as Texan survivors. the Big Bend region. From these trips and from In addition to his steer portraits, Reaugh his scores of sketchbooks, Reaugh produced painted the landscapes and long views of Texas hundreds of pastels of Texas landscapes and with pastels that truly captured the astounding Texas longhorns, which he considered to be the rainbow of colors that the terrain, the skies, and very symbol of the spirit of Texas: rugged, free, the vegetation presented to the inhabitant and and enduring. the viewer. His pastels of deep purple and pale His legacy, as he undoubtedly realized, magenta skies, of bleached beige and burnt- was in capturing the rapidly disappearing open orange hills and valleys, and of the silver-gray natural landscape of Texas. In his will, Reaugh of grasses stand in testament to a land, stated that he wished his works “to be kept although an adopted one, with which Reaugh together if only for historical reasons. They

Market Plaza by Robert Jenkins Onderdonk, 1880, oil on canvas. 30 Texas Almanac 2014–2015 create the spirit of the time. They show the sky of cowboys and bullfights, is also celebrated for unsullied by smoke, and the broad opalescent his murals. They depict the American South- not disfigured by wire fences or other west in stunning detail, from missionaries to signs of man.” cattle drives. Lea’s landscape mural, Southwest Perhaps Texas’s first truly celebrated native (1956), his gift to El Paso’s then-new public artist was Seymour Thomas. Born in East Tex- library, depicts the desert southwest landscape as at San Augustine, he studied under Gentilz in and vegetation in startling simplicity. The San Antonio and was well acquainted with the mountains and clouds are composed of broad, Onderdonks before receiving formal training in irregular geometric shapes, while the cacti the arts in Paris. His renderings of the Spanish form almost a portrait in the center of the work. missions in San Antonio are among his best- The modernist approach to the West Texas known works, true representations and vivid landscape does not diminish it. Whereas earlier for the viewer. Thomas’s landscapes, less well artists painted the Texas landscape intricately, known, are Impressionistic works in the vein of Lea’s modern minimalism is almost over- Claude Monet. Most prolific, though, were his whelming for the observer. portraits. Thomas drew his subjects—some of While some would argue that his great- the most important men and women in Texas, est talent lay in his landscapes, his portraits as well as the nation—with great humanity and are phenomenal. Lea captured every line and stunning accuracy. His image of expressive detail of his subjects and refused at the Battle of San Jacinto is proud and crisp, a to draw anyone less than forty years of age stirring and patriotic image. because he felt their faces lacked the depth and Modern and contemporary artists continued character he sought. to find beauty in the Texas landscape well into The Texas countryside remained a subject the twentieth century. Tom Lea, a native of El of interest for regionalists during the Depres- Paso, famous for his pen-and-ink illustrations sion and post–World War II era. Regionalists

Above the Falls of the Pedernales River by Karl Friedrich Hermann Lungk- witz, 1885, oil on canvas. History 31

Untitled by Frank Reaugh, 1918, oil on canvas.

rejected city life and instead created works de- picting rural scenes. Artists such as Alexandre Hogue and Florence McClung, both students of Reaugh, who painted in the 1940s, captured those images, but also noted the advance of or- der on the Texas wilderness. With the westward advancement of modern agriculture came fence lines, crop rows, and substantial barns. McClung’s work features the typical Texas farm in real clarity, showing rugged buildings and patchwork fields. In Hogue’s painting, the incomprehensible size of mountains and sky is contrasted with the front gate, fence line, and entry drive to a cattle ranch. The unnatural boundaries and geometric buildings that ranchers and farmers erected on the plains and in the valleys inspired works of art that not only celebrated the Texas countryside, but also chronicled the next phase of Texas history. A major part of that next era was the mod- ern oil industry. Hogue and fellow regionalist Lloyd Goff, another of Reaugh’s protégées, created works that featured the discovery, extraction process, and significance of oil and its industry. Although today we think of oil refineries as suburban and industrial, early oil Lady Macbeth by Elisabet Ney, 1902, producers dotted the countryside and employed marble. tough, rugged workers. The intensely modern 32 Texas Almanac 2014–2015

Toro Quieto by Tom Lea, 1946, watercolor, ink, and pastel on paper. images of oil derricks, pipelines, and machinery might seem out of place in the Texas art repertoire. Yet, those images of both the mod- ern Texas and the modern Texan represent the same spirit of adven- ture, independence, and triumph over hardship that their ancestors the pioneers, the revolutionaries, the cowboys, and the ranchers held. Texas’s art features its varied countryside with depictions of deserts, rough Hill Country, thick forests, and rugged plains. The contrasts in artistic styles mirror the contrasts in terrain. Texas is a

Portrait of Susanna Queisser by Friedrich Richard Petri, 1850, graphite with chalk on paper. History 33 state of paradoxes: the land is unforgiving yet was altered and so was its art. perfect for cattle grazing; it is stark yet contains Artists like Gentilz, Arpa, the Onderdonks, abundant life forms; it is both arid and hot and Ney, Reaugh, and Lea, were often the first to damp and humid. see, let alone paint, sketch, or sculpt the earlier The artists who came to and came from symbols of Texas and the American West. Texas portrayed and celebrated these character- Appreciation of Western and Texas art forces istics. They also celebrated those who settled the intellect of the observer to understand the here—the rough pioneer, the immigrant, the historical connections and the times in which rugged cattle rancher, the revolutionary leaders, each artist lived. They were periods critical and the oil workers. to the formation of this country, and they are The canvases, sketchbooks, pastels, statues, times that can never be retrieved and can only and other mediums of these great Texas artists be relived through the works of the artists who bear visual testimony to their affection for first captured them. the place and reveal to the world the history James Perry (J.P.) Bryan is founder and of the American West. The early cultural and Chairman of Torch Energy Advisors, Inc., of population domination of New England and the Houston and a collector of Texas artwork who Eastern Seaboard waned with the movement is committed to preserving Texas’s past. He is a of people westward. American culture was great-great nephew of Stephen F. Austin. transformed with the addition of the Louisiana Jamie Christy, PhD, is curator of The Torch Purchase and the annexation of Texas and the Collection in Houston. other southwestern states, pushing to the Pacific All artwork is courtesy of the Mary Jon and Coast. The very culture of the United States J.P. Bryan Visions of the West Collection. Scene on the Brazos A detail of the painting Scene on the Brazos, • More than 60,000 books, 1,500 newspapers 1893, by Frank Reaugh is displayed on the cover and periodicals, county tax rolls, theses and dis- of this edition, and the painting’s full panorama sertations, early Texas imprints, telephone and can be seen on the title page. It is used by permis- membership directories, yearbooks, and extensive sion of the Texas/Dallas History and Archives holdings on the John F. Kennedy assassination. Division of the Dallas Public Library, which • Around 1 million photographs, including his- owns the work. toric aerial photographs, buildings, street scenes, The library acquired this colorful scene of cultural and sporting events, and a wide range of a Texas cattle drive because Reaugh was a firm people from Dallas founder John Neely Bryan to a believer in making art available for public view- Cinco de Mayo celebration in Little . ing. Shortly after he settled in Oak Cliff in 1890, • A manuscript and archive collection that in- he worked with civic and cultural leaders to create cludes business records from Neiman Marcus and forums for public art displays. When the Carnegie the Interstate Theater chain; the editorial cartoons Library was built in 1901, Reaugh persuaded li- of Herc Ficklen, William McClanahan, and Bob brary officials to create an Art Room that would Taylor; the papers of theater director Margo Jones; display works from various artists and make them and papers from La Reunion colonists. accessible and free to the public. He started the art • Hundreds of oral history interviews with collection by donating Scene on the Brazos. people who were eyewitnesses to historical events. In 1907, when the library required more room, • More than 5,000 maps from the Spanish Co- the Art Room was moved to another location and lonial era to the present. eventually became the Dallas of Fine The Dallas Public Library was designated by Arts, now the Dallas Museum of Art. Because the Texas State Library and Archives Commission Scene on the Brazos was a gift from Reaugh, it as the Regional Historical Resource Depository for was kept at the library and is part of a permanent Dallas County. Under this agreement, older gov- collection that includes an original print of the ernment records with permanent historical value Declaration of Independence and Shakespeare’s that are no longer needed by the agency that cre- First Folio. ated them may be placed on deposit in the Texas/ The History and Archives Division collects, Dallas History and Archives Division. preserves, and makes available to researchers ma- The History and Archives Division is located terials in many formats relating to the history and at 1515 Young St., Dallas Texas, 75201; (214) 670- culture of Dallas and Texas, including: 1435; http://dallaslibrary2.org/texas/index.htm. Copyright of Texas Almanac is the property of Texas State Historical Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This item made available to the Bryan Museum through collaboration with the Texas State Historical Association (TSHA).