Sid Richardson Museum is celebrating 40 years of the art of the American West with a focused exhibition featuring the work of one of the most iconic saddle makers in the world, Edward H. Bohlin. The two saddles on display along with matching gear are accompanied by photos and materials that tell the story of how they came into the collection and the connections to the annual Fort Worth Stock Show, and in particular the All Western Parade, the largest non-motorized parade that kicks off the exposition each year.
Bohlin left his homeland of Sweden at 15, determined to be part of the American West. Landing first in Montana and then Wyoming, he settled into Los Angeles, where he became known for his meticulous craftsmanship that drew the attention of cowboy royalty and celebrities. In time he developed a world-wide reputation as a premier leather craftsman and silversmith, creating parade saddles for Hollywood cowboy legends including John Wayne and Roy Rogers. His leather and silver works of art became synonymous with the Pasadena Tournament of Roses Parade as cowboys and other equestrians proudly employed Bohlin saddles and spurs along the parade route. Bohlin saddles and other Western wear remain highly coveted by Western art collectors today.
Sid Richardson and Amon Carter were close friends in Fort Worth. Archived correspondence between the businessmen shows a constant exchange of gifts, with two of the most extravagant being parade saddles and matching gear made by Edward Bohlin and given to Richardson by Carter. One of the saddles on display is one of a set of four saddles that were presented to Stock Show officials in 1947 in honor of their recent success with the exposition. These saddles were ridden in the parade by Stock show leaders along Main Street where the Sid Richardson Museum has been open to the public since 1982.
This exhibit is on view with the continuing installation, "Picturing the American West," a thematic exhibition of over 40 works by Frederic Remington, Charles Russell and other Western art masters.
Sid Richardson Museum presents "Night & Day: Frederic Remington's Final Decade," which explores works made in the final decade of Remington’s life, when the artist alternated his canvases between the color dominant palettes of blue-green and yellow-orange. The works included range from 1900 to 1909, the year that Remington’s life was cut short by complications due to appendicitis at the young age of 48.
In these final years Remington was working to distance himself from his long-established reputation as an illustrator, to become accepted by the New York art world as a fine artist, as he embraced the painting style of the American Impressionists. In these late works he strove to revise his color palette, compositional structure, and brushwork as he set his Western subjects under an interchanging backdrop of the shadows of night and the dazzling light of day.
Throughout his career Remington revised and reworked compositions across media, from his illustrations to his oils to his three-dimensional bronzes. As part of this process of revision, Remington took extreme measures from 1907 to 1909 when, as part of his campaign toward changing the perception of his art, he destroyed well over 100 works that he felt did not satisfy his new standards of painting.
A contract made with Collier’s magazine that began in 1903 meant that many of the works he destroyed are preserved through halftone reproductions published by that journal. The inclusion of these images in this exhibition offers the opportunity to compare them with modified and remade compositions Remington produced in his final years.
The museum is extending the run of the exhibition to Sunday, April 30, to showcase a rare Remington watercolor titled Cold Day on Picket. The artwork was recently discovered by Museum Director Scott Winterrowd during a visit with Dallas collectors Duffy and Tina Oyster.
Sid Richardson Museum presents "Night & Day: Frederic Remington's Final Decade," which explores works made in the final decade of Remington’s life, when the artist alternated his canvases between the color dominant palettes of blue-green and yellow-orange. The works included range from 1900 to 1909, the year that Remington’s life was cut short by complications due to appendicitis at the young age of 48.
In these final years Remington was working to distance himself from his long-established reputation as an illustrator, to become accepted by the New York art world as a fine artist, as he embraced the painting style of the American Impressionists. In these late works he strove to revise his color palette, compositional structure, and brushwork as he set his Western subjects under an interchanging backdrop of the shadows of night and the dazzling light of day.
Throughout his career Remington revised and reworked compositions across media, from his illustrations to his oils to his three-dimensional bronzes. As part of this process of revision, Remington took extreme measures from 1907 to 1909 when, as part of his campaign toward changing the perception of his art, he destroyed well over 100 works that he felt did not satisfy his new standards of painting.
A contract made with Collier’s magazine that began in 1903 meant that many of the works he destroyed are preserved through halftone reproductions published by that journal. The inclusion of these images in this exhibition offers the opportunity to compare them with modified and remade compositions Remington produced in his final years.
The museum is extending the run of the exhibition to Sunday, April 30, to showcase a rare Remington watercolor titled Cold Day on Picket. The artwork was recently discovered by Museum Director Scott Winterrowd during a visit with Dallas collectors Duffy and Tina Oyster.
WHEN
WHERE
TICKET INFO
