Collector's Room

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Collector’s Room Catalog 2020

MANITOUGALLERIES M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


MANITOUGALLERIES Once in a Lifetime collector’s opportunity!

is offering a

As you may know, we often offer historical and deceased art in our world famous

Collector’s Room. This Collector’s Room catalog contains a fabulous curation of

Western Art and Historical Art at great prices. Please look through and email us at info@manitougalleries if you have any questions. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Artists Featured: Charles Partridge Adams Gary Carter Felipe Castaneda Jean Frederick Couty Edward S. Curtis C. Daly Stephen C. Elliot Walt Gonske Ernest Martin Hennings Lee Herring Robert Lougheed John Moyers Terri Kelly Moyers John Nieto Birger Sandzen Joseph Henry Sharp Vladan Stiha David B. Walkley M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


ROBERT LOUGHEED (1910 - 1982) Robert Lougheed, who came to be known as “the painter’s painter,” was born and raised on a farm in Ontario, Canada. As a young child, Bob spent hours on the farm sketching animals and wildlife. After contemplating a career as a professional hockey player, he decided to become an artist. He moved to Toronto to work as a newspaper illustrator, while studying at night at the Ontario College of Art. At the age of 25 Bob began a life-long friendship with another illustrator named John Clymer. It was Clymer who convinced Bob to move to New York, where he studied under Frank Vincent DuMond at the famed Arts Students League. He continued working for 30 years as an illustrator, and his work appeared in magazines such as National Geographic, Sports Afield and Reader’s Digest. In the late 1930s, Bob decided to move back to Canada and enlist in the Canadian Army. He was stationed in Quebec outside of Valleyfield where he continued to paint often. His Post Commander was so impressed with his talent that he allowed Bob time off to study at Ecole des Beaux Arts in Montreal. Bob received orders to ship out to Europe shortly before the war ended, but was released from service before shipping out. He spent the next 20 plus years in Westport, Connecticut where there was a large community of illustrators. During these years, among other things, he created the Flying Red Horse ads for Mobile Oil Company, and landed a multi-year commission for DuPont to paint the Annual National Field Dog Champions. It is in Westport that he met his wife Cordy, who was visiting from St. Croix, Virgin Islands, where she was working for the Red Cross. Soon after, Bob traveled to the Virgin Islands and the two were married. He traveled widely throughout the West, particularly the old Bell Ranch country of New Mexico. In 1970, he was commissioned by the Post Office Department to design the six-cent buffalo stamp for the Wildlife Conservation Series. In 1970 Bob and Cordy decided to make Santa Fe, New Mexico their home, where he lived until his death in 1982. Robert Lougheed was dedicated to painting. Although he spent over 30 years as an illustrator, he always considered himself a fine art painter. He spent much of his time traveling and painting Alaska, Quebec, Hawaii, the Virgin Islands, England, France and British Columbia. Relative to outdoor painting he used to say “the best information is always in front of you”, and he lived by this. Years of observation had taught him to work quickly and from nature, whenever possible. Robert Lougheed’s interest in art went far beyond his own easel. He was one of the prime movers in the founding of the National Academy of Western Art at the National Cowboy Hall of Fame, and continued to serve as an adviser for many years. He also generously gave his time as a teacher to many young painters who came to him. Throughout his lifetime Lougheed earned over 25 awards at both the National Academy of Western Art and the Cowboy Artists of America.

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Robert Lougheed, The Start Over Hurdles, Oil on Board, 24” x 30”, $ 6,500. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Robert Lougheed, Jill in the Heather, Oil on Board, 8” x 16” (Frame: 14” x 22”), $3,500.

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Robert Lougheed, Dave at Exmouth, Oil on Board, 8” x 16” (Frame: 14” x 22”), $3,500.

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Robert Lougheed, L’Isle d’Orleans, Oil on Board, 8” x 10” (Frame: 14” x 16”), $1,500. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Robert Lougheed, Village of Nadalliate, Oil on Board, 8” x 10” (Frame: 14” x 16”), $4,500. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Robert Lougheed, Mountain Goats, Oil on Board, 8” x 10” (Frame: 18” x 20”), $2,800 M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Robert Lougheed, Forest Fire in Canada, Oil on Board, 8” x 10”, $3,800. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Robert Lougheed, Portrait of Husky, Watercolor, 7” x 9” (Frame: 15” x 17”), $450. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Lee Herring, Going Home, Oil on Board, 8” x 16” (Frame: 14” x 22”), $650.

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TERRI KELLY MOYERS (B. 1953) Terri Kelly Moyers was born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada and is a long time resident of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Moyers studied at the Alberta College of Art. She attended the 1978 and 1979 Okanagan Game Farm Workshops taught by Clarence Tillenius and Robert Lougheed, and attended by Kenneth Riley, Wayne Wolfe, Harley Brown and John Clymer. Her honors include the Frederic Remington Award and the Nona Jean Hulsey Rumsey Buyer’s Choice Award, both earned at the 1996 Prix de West Show. Moyers’ favorite subject matter are the Canadian Rocky Mountains and the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. She emphasizes the strength and structure of wildlife and the landscape; her work is influenced by Carl Rungius. In 2004, she was the cover artist for Art of the West magazine, had her work displayed in the Forbes Building in New York City, and exhibited at the Masters of the American West Show at the Gene Autry Museum in Los Angeles. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Terri Kelly Moyers, Muledeer, Oil on Board, 24” x 30” (Frame: 32.5“ x 38.5”), $3,500. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Terri Kelly Moyers, Trail to Numtijah Lodge, Oil on Board, 10” x 11.5” (Frame: 16” x 17”), $850. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Terri Kelly Moyers, Mt Athabasca, Oil on Board, 10” x 12” (Frame: 18.5” x 20.5”), $1,650. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Terri Kelly Moyers, Landscape, Oil on Board, 10” x 12” (Frame: 15.5” x 17.5”), $950. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Terri Kelly Moyers, Floral Still Life, Oil on Canvas, 16” x 12”, (Frame: 25” x 21”), $1,800. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Terri Kelly Moyers, Bow Lake, Oil on Board, 8” x 10” (Frame: 18” x 20”), $950. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Terri Kelly Moyers, Mountain Landscape, Oil on Board, 12” x 12” (Frame: 18” x 18”), $950. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Terri Kelly Moyers, Bow Lake, Oil on Board, 10” x 12” (Frame: 13.5” x 15.5”), $750. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Edward S. Curtis, Zuni Girl, Photogravure on Tissue, 16” x 12”, $1,000. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


JOHN MOYERS (B. 1958) Born in Atlanta, Georgia, John Moyers became a noted painter of Western subjects. He was raised in Albuquerque, New Mexico and was exposed to fine art from an early age because his father, Bill Moyers, was a professional painter and sculptor. John attended the Laguna Beach School of Art and the California Institute for the Arts on a Walt Disney Studios scholarship. He worked briefly as an animation cartoonist in California and then went to British Columbia where he painted wild animals with Robert Lougheed. There he met Terri Kelly, his wife and well-known artist, and they settled in Santa Fe, New Mexico. In 1994, he was elected to membership in the Cowboy Artists of America. John Moyers won two gold medals at the 37th Annual (2002) Cowboy Artists of America Sale and Exhibition at the Phoenix Art Museum. One gold medal was for his oil on linen “ White Man’s Leftovers” and the second medal was awarded for an ink on paper titled “Making Time.” M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, The Gondolier, Watercolor, 24” x 14”, (Frame: 35” x 24.5”), $2,500. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Lake Agnes, Oil on Board, 11” x 13” (Frame: 18” x 20”), $950. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Tree Study, Oil on Board, 8” x 10” (Frame: 10” x 12”), $475. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Crowfoot Glacier, Oil on Board, 12” x 24”, (Frame: 19” x 31”), $3,500. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Still Life, Oil on Canvas, 18” x 14”, (Frame: 26” x 22”), $1,800. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Bow Lake Canada, Oil on Board, 10” x 12” (Frame: 16.5” x 18.5”), $1,650. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Dancing Shadows, Oil on Board, 11” x 14” (Frame: 17.5” x 20.5”), $2,250. SOLD M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Crowfoot Glacier, Oil on Board, 14” x 18”, (Frame: 23” x 27”), $2,250.

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John Moyers, Porthleven - Cornwall, Oil on Board, 12” x 12” (Frame: 19” x 19”), $1,800. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, At the Base of Mt. Lefroy, Oil on Board, 10” x 12” (Frame: 16.5” x 18.5”), $1,650. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Winter Landscape, Oil on Board, 8” x 10” (Frame: 13.5” x 15.5”), $800. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Gateway to the Mezquita, Oil on Board, 12” x 12” (Frame: 16” x 16”), $1,800. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Santa Fe, Oil on Board, 9” x 12” (Frame: 16” x 19”), $950. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Lake McCarther, Oil on Board, 10” x 12” (Frame: 17” x 19”), $850. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Winter Landscape, Oil on Board, 6” x 8” (Frame: 11” x 13”), $750.

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John Moyers, Lake O’Hara, Oil on Board, 10” x 12” (Frame: 17” x 19”), $850. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Along the Ice Fields Parkway, Oil on Board, 9” x 12” (Frame: 15.5” x 18.5”), $850. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Moyers, Indian Harbor - Nova Scotia, Oil on Board, 6” x 12” (Frame: 12.5” x 18.5”), $950.

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John Moyers, Bow Lake, Oil on Board, 10” x 10” (Frame: 16” x 16”), $1,800. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Stephen C. Elliot, Winter’s Squall, Long’s Peak, Oil on Board, 6” x 8” (Frame: 11” x 13”), $250. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


C. Daly, Still Life, Oil on Board, 10” x 8” (Frame: 14” x 12”), $200. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


David B. Walkley, Untitled Architectural Rendering, Oil on Board, 8” x 6” (Frame: 13” x 11”), $200. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Monterey California, Oil on Board, 4” x 6” (Frame: 14” x 17”), $200. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Napoleon, 19th Century Print, 8” x 5”, (Frame: 17” x 14”), $200. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Ballou’s Pictorial “Digger Indians of California Burning their Dead” May 2, 1857, 19th Century Print, 14” x 9.5”, (Frame: 23” x 19”), $200. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Ballou’s Pictorial “Storming of Chapultepec, Mexico, Generals Pillow and Bravo” March 15, 1856, 19th Century Print, 9.5” x 13”, (Frame: 18” x 22”), $200. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Ballou’s Pictorial “State of California”, September 15, 1855, 19th Century Print, 15” x 10”, (Frame: 22” x 18”), $200. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Pictorial War Record “General Scott Giving Orders to his Aides for the Advance of the Army”, 19th Century Print, 10” x 15”, (Frame: 18” x 22”), $200. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Felipe Castaneda, Desnudo de Alcares, Italian Marble, 20” x 10” x 13”, $20,000. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Joseph Henry Sharp, Taos Canyon Landscape, Oil, 30” x 36” (Frame: 39” x 44”), $75,000. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


JOSEPH HENRY SHARP (1859 - 1953) Born in Bridgeport, Ohio, Joseph Sharp was regarded as the “father of the Taos Art Colony,” and was known for his Indian figure and genre painting as well as for exquisitely colorful landscapes. He was one of the first Caucasian artists to visit New Mexico, arriving in Santa Fe in 1883. He was also a visitor to Alaska, being one of the early artists who visited there after the purchase of the Territory. Although Sharp was completely deaf from a childhood accident, he reportedly had a cheerful nature and was an avid traveler, always seeking learning experiences about other cultures. From childhood he was interested in Indians, and at age fourteen, because of his deafness, left public school to study art in Cincinnati at the McMicken School and the Cincinnati Academy of Art. His studio was in the same building as that of Henry Farny who gave him books on Pueblo Indians. At age 22, Sharp went to Antwerp, Belgium where he studied with Charles Verlat, and two years later he began traveling the American West, going first on a sketching trip that included Santa Fe, California, and north to the Columbia River. He completed numerous paintings of Indian figures to record their disappearing culture. In 1886, he returned to Europe for more study and enrolled at the Academy in Munich with Karl Von Marr. He also traveled with Frank Duveneck, the famous Cincinnati artist, through Spain and Italy. From 1892 to 1902, he taught classes at the Cincinnati Art Academy, and from 1895 to 1896, attended the Academie Julian in Paris where he met Ernest Blumenschein and Bert Geer Phillips, who later joined him in Taos. In 1893, Joseph Sharp first went to Taos, and his sketches from that trip were published in Harper’s Weekly. He began making summer trips West to sketch Indians, and in 1902, he painted in Arizona, California, Wyoming, and Montana. An admiring President Teddy Roosevelt had a studio built for Sharp at the Custer Battlefield site. From there Sharp traveled throughout the Plains to paint about 200 portraits of living Indians who had been in that battle. To achieve these paintings, he endured severe weather and physical hardship. By 1912, Sharp was a permanent resident of Taos, living across from Kit Carson’s homesite and painting many of the Pueblo Indians in their daily activities. His longtime, close friend and model was Jerry (Elk Foot) Mirabal, who, dying in 1980, lived to be 110. Sharp continued to travel, going frequently to Hawaii and California during the winters where he completed numerous floral landscapes. He also stayed in close touch with his hometown of Cincinnati, where he relied upon friends in the Cincinnati Art Museum for canvas and certain types of paint, and in December, 1915, he held the first of fifteen annual Christmas exhibitions there. He died in Pasadena on August 29, 1953. His Indian paintings are prized for their detailed accuracy, and many of them are in the collection of the Department of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


John Nieto, Pelican Crown, Acrylic, 16” x 20” (Frame: 20” x 24”), $5,000.

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JOHN NIETO (1936 - 2018) John Nieto calls himself an American artist who paints Indians, not an Indian artist. An acclaimed leader of his field, but taking a separate path to represent Native Americans in striking symbolic portraits, Nieto is exhibited worldwide and has had paintings accepted for the Presidential library. He does not attempt to be authentic, but to show a core Native spirit. His Indians seem to belong to a universal tribe that suggest a common, Far Eastern origin, and connection with a contemporary group. Early this century, Indian artists were cultivated in a white man’s school and encouraged to portray ancestral and reservation experiences. Art from that period was inauthentic and oblivious to world trends. Since mid-century, Indian-born artists began to tell a bitter truth of Indian pain from alcoholism and other social problems. John Nieto belongs to neither camp. His Indians are not idealized or troubled. They are potters, warriors, silversmiths or shamans in traditional garb, as well as indigenous wildlife, painted in brilliant, oddly paired colors, and radiate a quiet dignity. “There is no formula for my faces. I paint the dance of identity around the pan-Indian bone structure of all Native Americans. I am painting a person, but I am painting much more than that,” says Nieto. He says that his art “is the result of an emotional involvement with my subject matter rather than a cerebral one.” He uses broad strokes and thick layers of brilliant colors with a halo of contrasting color traced around each figure. His electric hues are unmistakable. Nieto’s work reflects his upbringing from Hispanic and Indian-born parents. His distinct style comes not only from his native New Mexico, where he still lives, but also from a global awareness and travels to Europe. His unfettered use of brilliant color has been likened to the Fauves of the 1920s French movement. Nieto has spent time in Paris and also seems to be influenced by European expressionists who released the subconscious onto canvases. He also uses painting techniques and a spiritual awareness from the Far East. His approach is ritualistic. “I’m in a trance when I paint. It’s like being a drummer -you don’t look at the drums, you just know intuitively where they are.” An artist of established international reputation, Nieto’s work has been exhibited in Europe, Japan, Latin America, and Africa, in addition to his annual shows in Santa Fe, New York and Palm Springs. In 1981 his work was exhibited at the Salon D`Automne/Grand Palais in Paris, France. His work, the subject of two books and numerous articles, is also represented in the permanent collection of the National Museum of Wildlife Art. In 1994, Nieto received New Mexico’s Governor’s Award for achievement in the Arts. He has served on the Advisory Board of The Wheelwright Museum in Santa Fe, the Advisory Board of the Native American Preparatory School, and is a Regent at his alma mater, Southern Methodist University in Dallas, where he received his Bachelor of Arts Degree. John Nieto lived and worked in Corrales, New Mexico, on the banks of the Rio Grande River. His roots run deep in the state of his birth, with ancestors going back more than 300 years. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Gary Carter, Spanish Creek Roans, Oil, 34” x 50” (Frame: 44” x 61”), $20,000.

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Jean Frederic Couty, Untitled, Oil, 24” x 36” (Frame: 31” x 40”), $4,500.

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Vladan Stiha, Untitled, Oil, 36” x 48” (Frame: 40” x 49”), $5,500. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


VLADAN STIHA (1908 - 1992) Vladan Stiha, a painter of Western American landscapes, Indians and Cowboys, began his long, colorful life in Belgrade, Yugoslavia on October 18, 1908. His life would end three continents and eighty-four years later on April 25, 1992, at the end of the old Santa Fe Trail in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Born into a family of artists, Stiha learned to draw and paint from his father. He began formal art education in Belgrade, then had the opportunity to study at The Academy of Arts in Vienna with Professor Karl Faringer, and later with Professor Carlo Saverri at the Academy of Art in Rome. Stiha spent a total of 20 years in South America after Yugoslavia was invaded during World War II. Since their first choice of emigration, the United States, had its quota filled, Stiha and his wife Elena chose Buenos Aires as a first refuge. An impressionistic style emerged for Stiha during this period, inspired by his freedom and the colorful backgrounds of the Pampas and Gauchos, resulting in a vibrant expression of his individuality on his canvas. Stiha’s spirit was always searching, and after 10 years in Argentina his friends in Brazil enticed him to relocate to Sao Paulo. The dramatic beaches and primitive marketplaces in Bahia captured Stiha’s heart and he fell in love with the colorful peasants who filled his canvases with the rich colors of his pastel palette. He was then a mature artist, confident in his own style and technique, and it was during this period that he began experimenting with Cubism. Stiha’s studio and art school in Brazil was located across the street from the American Embassy. His reputation as a celebrated European and South American artist attracted the attention of the United States through the American Consulate, and the Stihas were offered citizenship. Their long awaited dream of immigrating to the United States came true when Stiha was 62 years of age and Elena was 66. After a short stay on the West Coast, they found their way to New Mexico, opening the Stiha Gallery at the historic La Fonda Hotel in 1971. During their first year in the Southwest, the Stihas traveled from reservation to reservation, painting traditional Indian pageants and their reenactments of the arrival of settlers in covered wagons. These ceremonies were held in the spirit of healing the old wounds by “walking in the white man’s shoes.” Stiha’s ability as a colorist and portrait painter earned him a place in the collections of museums like the Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C.; Museum of New Mexico, Santa Fe; Navajo Ceremonial Museum; Museum of the Southwest, Midland, Texas; Pioneer Museum, Colorado Springs, Colorado; Oklahoma Museum of Art, Red Ridges, Oklahoma; and Fort Huachuca Historic Museum in Arizona. Vladan Stiha died in 1992, and his widow, Elena, died in Santa Fe in July, 2010. She said that her husband never painted from photographs; his compositions were always from his mind’s eye. He was always sketching, whether it was on place mats in restaurants or programs in concerts . . . anytime he was idle his hands would find a piece of paper to give his ideas life. People familiar with his work are said to look up on a beautiful day in Santa Fe and say “There’s a Stiha sky!”

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Ernest Martin Hennings, Portrait of a Socialite, Oil, 18” x 17” (Frame: 26” x 24”), $10,000. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


ERNEST MARTIN HENNINGS (1886 - 1956) Born in Pennsgrove, New Jersey and raised in Chicago by German immigrant parents, Ernest Hennings became a highly recognized painter of Western subjects, particularly of Indians of New Mexico where he joined The Taos Society of Artists. Of his painting, it was written: “He was most successful in unifying the human figure with a sunshine-filled, happy, natural setting.” (Zellman 808). The last project of the artist before his death in 1956, was a series of paintings at the Navajo Reservation in Ganado for a Santa Fe Railroad calendar. When he was young, his family moved to Chicago, and for five years, he studied at the Art Institute of Chicago from which he graduated with honors. After working six years as a commercial artist, in 1912 he enrolled at the Munich Academy in Germany where he learned to paint in the style of academic realism. Walter Thor, a portrait artist, was one of his highly influential teachers, and he emphasized the need of the artist to enter the soul of their subjects. Hennings also studied with Franz von Stuck, a proponent of classical theories of beauty, patterning, craftsmanship and drafting. At that time pre-war Munich was one of the most exciting cultural centers in Europe, and the battles between classical academy art and “Jugendstil,” a German Art Nouveau movement were in full swing. Hennings remained somewhat open to the latter theories, thinking it best to be open to a variety of influences and then settling on one’s own style. In Munich, he also became friends with artists Walter Ufer and Victor Higgins. In 1915, at the beginning of World War I, he returned to Chicago as a commercial artist and muralist who tended to paint with thick, broad brush strokes and darkened the palette of the Munich School. But he also reflected the waving, sinuous lines of “Jugendstil” painters. In 1917, Carter Harrison, a wealthy patron and former Mayor of Chicago, and Oscar Mayer, Harrison’s partner in an art-buying venture, sponsored Hennings on a trip to Taos, New Mexico, a life-changing venture for Hennings. Three years earlier Harrison had done the same for several other artists including Ufer and Higgins. In 1921, Hennings became a full time resident of Taos, having had a successful one-man exhibition in Chicago at Marshall Field and Company. At that event, Hennings met his future wife, Helen Otte, and upon marrying, the couple traveled in Europe for 16 months. In 1924, Hennings joined his friends Ufer and Higgins as a member of The Taos Society of Artists, whose purpose was to generate sales of their artwork. Ufer and Higgins had been members for several years. For the remainder of his career, Hennings was devoted to painting the West including commissioned portraits of Navajo Indians for the Santa Fe Railroad. However, his primary subjects were the New Mexico Indians, which he portrayed as dignified, heroic people. His technique was to paint the background first and then put figures in various positions to determine which was the most successful composition.

He worked on several canvases at once and disavowed modernist avant-garde movements. The bright colors of his paintings have remained intact because he applied his oil paints thinly and allowed long periods of drying before applying varnish. This method has prevented yellowing and cracking. Few of his paintings are dated. His wife, Helen Otte Hennings, kept a meticulous record, but when she moved from Taos to Chicago in 1979, it was lost, and no copy has ever been found. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Charles Partridge Adams, Late Fall Mountains, Sierras, Oil, 19” x 29” (Frame: 27.5” x 37”), $12,000.

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CHARLES PARTRIDGE ADAMS (1858 - 1942) Young Charles Adams moved from Massachusetts to Denver, CO in 1876 at the age of 18. A year later he began working at the Chain and Hardy bookstore, where he received encouragement for his artistic interests from Helen Henderson Chain, who had been a pupil of the noted artist, George Inness. A three-month camping trip in the Rockies with another young artist in 1881 resulted in numerous sketches and paintings. In 1885 he traveled to the East Coast, and visited the studios of George Inness and Worthington Whittredge, and the following year he visited the California studios of William Keith and Thomas Hill. Though not isolated from other artists, Adams was largely self-taught, experimenting with different styles and techniques and continuing to use those that best served his vision and subject matter. His paintings were first exhibited publicly in Denver in 1886, and he exhibited work in both local and national shows through 1904. In 1893 Adams established his first Denver studio, and began to paint watercolors in addition to oils. Since watercolors were less expensive, they sold readily, and from that time on Adams painted many watercolors. In 1900, Charles Adams began renting a studio in Estes Park during the summer months, and in 1905 he built a studio there called “The Sketchbox” on Fish Creek Road, a building which still stands. Many paintings were purchased there by visitors to nearby Rocky Mountain National Park, and taken home to all parts of the country, and even abroad. He was so successful that by the end of the summer he was able to pay off the cost of building “The Sketchbox” and the land upon which it stood. Besides traveling extensively in the Colorado Rockies, he traveled to New Mexico, Arizona and Wyoming, painting the Tetons and Yellowstone, and Montana, where he painted Glacier National Park. An earlier trip to Louisiana in 1890 and a trip to Europe in 1914 also resulted in a few paintings. In 1917 Adams became quite ill and spent the winter in Los Angeles. He purchased a home there in 1920, and bought a second home in Laguna Beach in 1926. Since paintings of the Colorado mountains were not in demand in California, he primarily painted coastal scenes and a few of the California mountains, while continuing to paint some Colorado scenes from memory for sale in Colorado. In California Adams never achieved the success he had enjoyed in Colorado, though he continued to paint until his death in 1942.

M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Birger Sandzen, The Mighty Peak, Oil, 48” x 36” (Frame: 58” x 44”), $250,000. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


BIRGER SANDZEN (1871 - 1954) Birger Sandzen had a long, distinguished career as an art professor at Bethany College in Lindsborg, Kansas and as an impressionist landscape painter. He is best known for his modernist style with masses of paint, akin to that of Vincent Van Gogh and Paul Cezanne, and for Rocky Mountain Landscape subjects. His early work is Tonalist in style in the manner of Scandinavian Romanticism, but after he began taking trips to Colorado, his work became much more Expressionist and brightly colored. Sven Birger Sandzen was born in Blidsberg, Sweden to Clara Elizabeth and Johan Peter Sandzen. His mother had studied drawing and his father, a minister, enjoyed writing poetry and playing the violin. When Birger’s parents noticed his artistic inclination, they asked a young minister to give drawing lessons to the nine year old. At the age of 10, he attended the College and Academy of Skara. Here his drawing and painting lessons continued under Olof Erlandsson, a graduate of the Royal Academy at Stockholm. After graduation from Skara College, Sandzen spent a semester at Lund University attending art history lectures and continuing the study of French. Following Lund University he went to the technical high school at Stockholm, where he studied perspective and form drawing. Sandzen joined a group of young artists and they rented a studio at Anders Zorn’s suggestion. They received instruction from Anders as well as Richard Bergh, a well-known portrait painter, and Per Hasselberg, one of Sweden’s best sculptors. These young artists formed “The Art School of the Artists’ League,” which played an important part in the development of modern Swedish art. In the summer of 1894 Sandzen returned to Sweden where he read the book titled I Sverige by a young Swedish-American educator, Dr. Carl A. Swensson. Dr. Swensson, a college president, told of his struggles on the plains of Kansas and he challenged other young Swedes to come help him. Sandzen was excited by the proposition and wrote Dr. Swensson a letter asking if he could use a young artist who could sing tenor and teach French. As soon as Sandzen received the cable offering him a job, he accepted and arrived in Lindsborg, Kansas the day college opened in the fall. Birger soon realized Lindsborg was where he wanted to make his home with the inspiring atmosphere of the new College and energy of the young teachers and president. He built a home, where he continued to live for 54 years. In 1900 he married Augusta Alfrida Leksell, a gifted pianist. They had one daughter, Margaret Elizabeth. With time, Sandzen became more and more involved in teaching, even his evenings were reserved for class time. At around nine or ten in the evening he would find time for his own drawing. Sandzen’s inspiration came from his summers spent in Colorado, Utah, and New Mexico. Sandzen spent his time trying to generate an interest in art by talking to people about art, organizing exhibitions and establishing art clubs. He donated artwork to the local art club to help raise money for the purchasing of art books for the library, the financing of exhibitions, and the occasional awarding of a scholarship. The Babcock Galleries in New York hosted two large exhibitions of Sandzen’s work in 1922 and 1923. His sponsors, the American-Scandinavian Foundation, enthusiastically invited him to come. Sandzen’s reply was that he had classes and could not leave. Sandzen retired after 52 years of teaching at Bethany College. Sandzen had honorary doctorates bestowed upon him by Midland College of Fremont, Nebraska by Nebraska University, and by Kansas State College. In 1940 he was made a Knight if the Swedish Order of the North Star. After any months of failing health, Birger Sandzen passed away quietly in his home on June 19, 1954. M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


Walt Gonske, Corrales Apple Orchard, Oil, 30” x 36” (Frame: 36” x 42”), $15,000. SOLD M A N I TO U G A L L E R I E S


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