Let's keep it wild.: Frederic Remington

27 November 2012

Frederic Remington

Self-Portrait on a Horse (1890)

Born at Canton, New York USA, Frederic Remington (1861-1909) became the foremost turn-of -the-century illustrator, painter and sculptor of western action-packed subjects with cowboys, Indians, horses, soldiers and other frontier characters.

His style was realistic and much of his work was narrative with strong implication that the West belonged to the white man, but his Indians were portrayed with dignity and nobility.

In 1878 Frederic Remington entered the Yale School of Fine Arts for one year, excelling at football and art.

In the next years, he made many trips to the West and Plains States and worked as a cowboy, ranch hand, lumberjack and gold miner in Apache country in Arizona. He experienced frontier America from Canada to the Rio Grande; the horses he loved were key figures everywhere he went, depicted in every manner of action.

Frederic Remington painted and sculpted the animals often, frequently at full gallop, but always juxtaposed them with human figures, never drawing single horse portraits.

His early paintings of the West were much more literal depictions than his romanticized later ones of the disappearing West. In his later years, he preferred to paint nocturnes because it allowed him greater freedom and depth of perspective.

In December of 1909, he died the morning after Christmas when he was age 48. He created 22 bronzes and about 3000 paintings.

Frederic Remington had an unusual approach to color: he used it extremely successfully to set a mood, to strike an atmospheric note. He often chose a single dominant color, applying paint richly and roughly, around which the rest of the artwork was composed.

Text source: www ask art

For me, the artworks of Frederic Remington are among the most beautiful ever seen.