Don Crowley

1926 - 2019

Born in Redlands, California and raised in Santa Ana, California, Donald V. Crowley couldn’t remember a time when he wasn’t drawing. Crowley later became close friends with and a painting companion of watercolorist Mervin Corning. Crowley was heavily influenced early on by Frederic Remington’s book Done in the Open and by World Famous Paintings, a book on English painters.

After having served in the U.S. Navy and the Merchant Marines, Crowley used the GI Bill to pay the tuition to the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles. He later commented that the GI Bill “was the greatest thing the government ever did.” After college he moved to New York City where he worked for 21 years as a commercial illustrator, seven of them with the Charles E. Cooper Studio. He described that time in his life as one spent among "unbearably pretentious" people.

When he noticed in the late 1960s that his friend James Bama had a successful oneman show in Wyoming, he moved his family out west, eventually ending up in Arizona. Crowley enjoyed spending time on Paiute and Apache reservations and began focusing on painting portraits of Indians, as well as Indians engaged in everyday activities. Crowley deeply respected the inner dignity of the Indians and was intrigued by their costumes. The five children of the Martineaus family, Paiutes living in Kaibab, Arizona, were for years models for his paintings. The young lady featured in the painting from this collection is most likely Rachel Martineaus, who modeled for Crowley for more than two decades, beginning at the age of two. Crowley once said, when asked about his art, "Art is like sex. It's something that you do; not something that you talk about." But, in his later years he became more comfortable talking about his success as an artist. “After 43 years in the business, I am finally comfortable with the title of artist,” and “I owe my success to the power of negative thinking. Fear is a great motivator. I used to worry about creating a certain look, but I have finally accepted myself for who I am.”At the age of 68, and as it turned out with another quarter century of work ahead, Crowley was elected a member the Cowboy Artists of America.

Working from his home and studio in the mountainous area of northwest Tucson, Crowley typically painted a 9 x 12 inch sketch before starting work on the full-size painting, because as he explained, “I can visualize the finished product and resolve any problems before going on to the larger canvas,” and “I adhere to W.C. Fields’ admonition that, ‘Anything worth having is worth stealing.’ I still borrow a good solution whenever I can.”

Crowley’s paintings have been described as hyper-realistic, however, he continued to experiment with his technique saying, “I’ve finally realized that I don’t have to take a painting to the ultimate finish. Not every detail is necessary or even desirable.”

PAIUTE AUTUMN Oil on Masonite 12 x 9 inches