1942.4, Jerry Bywaters, On the Ranch


GENERAL DESCRIPTION  
Jerry Bywaters was an important voice in the arts in Texas, having trained in Dallas and in the East with Robert Vonnoh, Bruce Crane, and John Sloan. He was a founder of the Dallas Artists League, editor of the magazine Southwestern Arts, a critic for the Dallas Morning News, and director of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts from 1942 until his retirement in 1964.  While many regional artists in the prewar years were painting nostalgic anecdotal visions of America, Bywaters took a different tack.  Like a memento mori still life of an earlier century, On the Ranch is an eerie assemblage of detritus cataloguing the history of Texas—from the American Indian symbolized by the arrowhead, to the gunslinger, the cowpoke, the rancher who fenced in the range, and the vanished inhabitants of Bywaters's own time, driven from the ranch perhaps by the blows of depression and drought.

Excerpt from
Bonnie Pitman, ed., Dallas Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012), 274.

NOTES
This note was started by Erin Pinon, summer 2016 and saved as #incomplete. EAS will submit this #draft after reviewing the associated objects/files.


Text pulled from EAS note-
Jerry Bywaters was an important voice in the arts in Texas, having trained in Dallas and in the east with Robert Vonnoh, Bruce Crane, and John Sloan. He was a founder of the Dallas Art League, editor of the magazine Southwestern Arts, a critic of the Dallas Morning News, and director of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts from 1942 until his retirement in 1964. While many regional artists in the prewar years were painting nostalgic anecdotal visions of America, Bywaters took a different tact. Like a momento mori still life of an earlier century, On the Ranch, is an errie assemblage of detritus cataloguing the history of Texas—from the American Indian symbolized by the arrowhead, to the gun slinger, the cowpoke, the rancher who fenced in the range, and the vanishing inhabitants of Bywaters's own time driven from the ranch perhaps by the blows of depression and drought.

Labels from Dallas Nine folder in the education files.

Exhibition: Lone Star Regionalism :The Dallas Nine and their Circle 1928-1945, February 3, 1985-July 10, 1988

Related Objects
1985.123 Jerry Bywaters, Study for On the Ranch
Artist/designers

Cultures

Geography 
Place of origin: Texas (state/United States): TGN: 7007826
Place of origin: Southwest (general region/United States): TGN: 4010660

Process/materials
Oil and tempera on Masonite

Historical periods

Individuals

Subject terms

RELATED OBJECTS 

PROVENANCE 
From 1942:  Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, E.M. (Ted) Dealy Purchase Prize, Thirteenth Allied Arts Exhibition, purchased from the artist. [1]
 
[1]  The name of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, founded in 1933, was changed to the Dallas Museum of Art in 1983.

AUDIO ASSETS 

VIDEO ASSETS

IMAGE ASSETS

WEB RESOURCES 

ARCHIVAL RESOURCES

FUN FACTS
  • The DMA also owns a study for this painting, Study for On the Ranch. (1985.123)

TEACHING IDEAS

RULES
Apply to objects where number equals 1942.4
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General Description
 
Jerry Bywaters was an important voice in the arts in Texas, having trained in Dallas and in the East with Robert Vonnoh, Bruce Crane, and John Sloan. He was a founder of the Dallas Artists League, editor of the magazine Southwestern Arts, a critic for the Dallas Morning News, and director of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts from 1942 until his retirement in 1964.  While many regional artists in the prewar years were painting nostalgic anecdotal visions of America, Bywaters took a different tack.  Like a memento mori still life of an earlier century, On the Ranch is an eerie assemblage of detritus cataloguing the history of Texas—from the American Indian symbolized by the arrowhead, to the gunslinger, the cowpoke, the rancher who fenced in the range, and the vanished inhabitants of Bywaters's own time, driven from the ranch perhaps by the blows of depression and drought.

Excerpt from
Bonnie Pitman, ed., Dallas Museum of Art: A Guide to the Collection (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012), 274.

Fun Facts
  • The DMA also owns a study for this painting, Study for On the Ranch. (1985.123)

Archival Resources

Web Resources
 

Notes
This note was started by Erin Pinon, summer 2016 and saved as #incomplete. EAS will submit this #draft after reviewing the associated objects/files.


Text pulled from EAS note-
Jerry Bywaters was an important voice in the arts in Texas, having trained in Dallas and in the east with Robert Vonnoh, Bruce Crane, and John Sloan. He was a founder of the Dallas Art League, editor of the magazine Southwestern Arts, a critic of the Dallas Morning News, and director of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts from 1942 until his retirement in 1964. While many regional artists in the prewar years were painting nostalgic anecdotal visions of America, Bywaters took a different tact. Like a momento mori still life of an earlier century, On the Ranch, is an errie assemblage of detritus cataloguing the history of Texas—from the American Indian symbolized by the arrowhead, to the gun slinger, the cowpoke, the rancher who fenced in the range, and the vanishing inhabitants of Bywaters's own time driven from the ranch perhaps by the blows of depression and drought.

Labels from Dallas Nine folder in the education files.

Exhibition: Lone Star Regionalism :The Dallas Nine and their Circle 1928-1945, February 3, 1985-July 10, 1988

Related Objects
1985.123 Jerry Bywaters, Study for On the Ranch
Artist/designers

Cultures

Geography 
Place of origin: Texas (state/United States): TGN: 7007826
Place of origin: Southwest (general region/United States): TGN: 4010660

Process/materials
Oil and tempera on Masonite

Historical periods

Individuals

Subject terms

RELATED OBJECTS 

PROVENANCE 
From 1942:  Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, E.M. (Ted) Dealy Purchase Prize, Thirteenth Allied Arts Exhibition, purchased from the artist. [1]
 
[1]  The name of the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, founded in 1933, was changed to the Dallas Museum of Art in 1983.

AUDIO ASSETS 

VIDEO ASSETS

rules
Apply To
Objects
number
Equals
1942.4
tags
#draft
#completed
%copyedited_Gail
%Archived
.TeachingIdeas
trees (plants): AAT: 300132410
@Schiller
*American Art
sky: AAT: 300263064
@Russell
Southwest (general region/United States): TGN: 4010660
Texas (state/United States): TGN: 7007826
mountains: AAT: 300008795
skull (skeleton component): AAT: 300191856
clouds: AAT: 300343840
Surrealist (style or movement): AAT: 300021512
Sloan_John: ULAN: 500014645
deserts: AAT: 300008916
Caryophyllales (order/plant): AAT: 300375562
cacti (cactus/Cactacaeae family): AAT: 300417746
bone (material): AAT: 300011798
arrows: AAT: 300036976
erosion: AAT: 300054116
soil: AAT: 300014330
dunes: AAT: 300008750
spurs (costume accessories): AAT: 300036923
branches (plant components): AAT: 300379798
fences (site elements): AAT: 300005044
barbed wire: AAT: 300011064
horizon line: AAT: 300067731
memento mori: AAT: 300257053
teeth (animal components): AAT: 300400467
windmills: AAT: 300006273
Vonnoh_Robert William: ULAN: 500030182
sand: AAT: 300014341
ranches (agricultural complexes): AAT: 300000241
cowbells: AAT: 300041875
pistols: AAT: 300037160
source file
object_notes_3_c-0040.xml.nores