Image of the Day, April 29, 2012

By Donna Poutlon

“I decided very early that I would be an American painter. I travelled the county over, and the West appealed to me. There is no phase of landscape in which we are not richer, more varied and interesting… ” – Thomas Moran

Thomas Moran, watercolor. Credit: Painters of Utah's Canyons and Deserts.Traveling with John Wesley Powell during the summer of 1873, Thomas Moran painted Colburn’s Butte. Powell often named lakes and mountains after people on his expeditions. He named the peak after J.E. Colburn a writer for the New York Times who was travelling with the survey expedition to record his impressions of the southwest for a chapter in William Cullen Bryan’s Picturesque American.

Photograph of a Paiute Youth, Thomas Moran, and J.E. Colburn, 1873. Credit: Painters of Utah's Canyons and Deserts.

Paintings Without Color: The Grisaille

By Donna Poulton

Known as ‘dead coloring’ by the old masters, grisaille paintings are characterized by the use of monochromatic (one color) paint.  Typically the paint used is a tone of black, but artists also use indigo blue, sepia or brown.  Starting in the sixteenth century the technique was used as ‘underpainting’ to help artists define light and dark areas of the painting before adding color.

Credit: Coeur D’Alene Art Auction

Thomas Moran (1837-1926),  Avalanche in Cottonwood Canyon, c. 1895, oil on board, 14 x 11 in.

Grisaille paintings are often offered for sale by western art auctions and galleries today. Oftentimes you’ll hear viewers wondering why the artist “didn’t finish the painting.” The simple answer is the works are finished. Newspapers and magazines in the latter part of the 19^th century and early 20^th needed black and white images for their publications—especially as they tried to fill the high demand of their readership for images of the West.

Credit: Coeur D’Alene Art Auction

Frederic Remington (1861-1909), He Made his Magazine Gun Blaze…, 1900, oil on canvas, 40 x 27 in.

In order to create the truest color, with the highest sense of drama, illustrators such as Thomas Moran, Frederic Remington, Charles Russell, Maynard Dixon, Frank Tenney Johnson, Herbert Buck Dunton, and William H.D. Koerner painted their illustrations for print using the tonal variations of black and white paint.

Credit: Christie’s New York, Rockerfeller Center

Frederic Remington (1861-1909), He Was the Law (Billy the Kid), c.1901, oil on canvas, 27 x 40 in.

Credit: Christie’s Los Angeles

Maynard Dixon (1875-1846), Go Get One, 1912, oil on board, 27 x 19 in.

Credit: Bonhams & Butterfields San Francisco

Maynard Dixon (1875-1846), The Car Was at His Hip-Almost, 1913, gouache on paper, 29 x 20 in.

Credit: Christie’s Los Angeles 10.29.08

Herbert Buck Dunton (1878-1936), Follerin’ the Tracks, 1907, oil on canvas, 30 x 18 in.

Painting of the Day, October 21, 2011

By Donna Poulton

Thomas Moran (1837 – 1926), Pack Trail, Grand Canyon, grisaille on board, 11 x 6 in. 

The value range achieved with grisaille, or the use of monochromatic color, made it easier for Moran to translate the sketch Pack Trail, Grand Canyon into a black and white lithograph that would have been used for one of the many commissions he did for magazines and newspapers.

Western Landscape Goes East

by Donna Poulton

Thomas Moran's 19^th Century paintings of the western landscape continue to migrate to the East. The National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. recently received a gift of the famed artist’s painting Green River Cliffs, Wyoming from collector Vern Milligan who purchased it in 1994 for $2.7 million.

Moran is well known for his powerful paintings of the West. His Grand Canon of the Yellowstone, and Chasm of the Colorado were bought by Congress to grace the U.S. Capitol in the 1870s.

But it is his paintings of Green River Wyoming that are attracting attention and large auction records.  In 2008, his 1878 painting of Green River of Wyoming sold for a staggering $17.7 million.

Moran made numerous treks to the west, most often on the Transcontinental Railroad crossing the Green River at Green River, Wyoming. This was also the embarkation point of John Wesley Powell’s heroic adventure to run the course of the Green and Colorado Rivers.

John Wesley Powell on Green River. Photo courtesy of Utah Historic Society

Train Station in Green River, Wyoming. Photo courtesy of Wyoming Tales and Trails

A true test of the market will happen at the Scottsdale Art Auction on April 2^nd, 2011 when Moran’s Indian Summer, Green River, Wyoming is sold to the highest bidder. The painting is smaller than others that have sold for high prices and it was painted later in Moran’s life, but if it follows recent trends, it might bring well over the high estimate of $5 million.

Green River, Wyoming. Photos by C.N. Plummer