Frederic Remington specialized in his paintings and sculpting of the American West.
Now, visitors to the Ellen Noel Art Museum have an opportunity to see many of his earlier works in an exhibition called “Dramatic Moments”.
The exhibit presents an outstanding collection of large-size vintage engravings that Remington made that appeared in publications such as Harper’s Weekly.
These are the images that launched Remington’s illustration career and that provided the platform from which he evolved into one of the West’s most famous fine art painters.
“How he got started as an artist was he was an illustrator of magazines at the time,” Ellen Noel Art Museum Curator Daniel Zies said. “The one we have in the exhibition are Harper’s Weekly.”
During his travels to the west, Remington would document what he saw.
“They were using engravings to illustrate photos in newspapers and magazines and what not,” Zies said. “That’s where all this comes into play.”
This particular exhibition is on loan from the Lee Silliman Engraving Collection.
“This is from a personal collection that we got it form,” Zies said. “It’s borrowed. He does primarily western illustrations and print making that’s his focus. He put this exhibition together and he’s been collecting Remington’s for a while.”
What stands out the most about this exhibit for Zies is that this is from before he started to be known for paintings and sculpting.
“I love how this is kind of the earlier stuff for Remington,” Zies said. “Most people know him as a painter and sculptor but his is how he got started. You can see a lot of what he’s trying to do with these illustrations. We do have a couple of copies of his sculptors in the exhibition as well.”
The images not only document Remington’s rise to prominence and wealth but also chronicle the convulsive events in the closing decades of the western frontier era.
“This is an interesting exhibit in the fact that it’s more of a historical exhibition and speaks to more than the actual engravings that actually speak to a process of how people got visual information pre years of photography,” Ellen Noel Executive Director Sheila Perry said. “These were printed in a magazine like Harper’s Weekly and people would collect them and frame them and put them in their house. There’s a social component to it not just an artistic component. There’s the artistic merit but it’s also a unique period of American history where artists documented the visuals and it was printed in things like magazines and newspapers.”
Remington would eventually move on to painting and sculpting. While most people know him as a western painter, he was actually northerner, born in New York. He died in 1909 at the age of 48.
“Everyone thinks he was born in the west but he’s actually a northerner which I think is interesting,” Zies said.
Over the course of his life, Remington would become known for his western genre style of painting.
“People know of him,” Perry said. “People have seen his work. It’s work that speaks to them in many ways. We’re really happy that we were able to bring some of his earlier works because it’s not typical of the stuff you see when you see a Remington. Also, he started from humble beginnings and was primarily self taught, his ability to render really was extraordinary. We’re happy to bring something that was socially really interesting and celebrate a great American artist.”
Perry says so far, the exhibit has drawn plenty of positive responses from visitors.
“People are really enjoying it,” Perry said. “It’s a quiet exhibit. It’s one of those experiences you go around and there’s a lot going on visually going on. People take their time to look at each one. People find it really intriguing. They’re also interested in seeing American history come to life from a bygone era. It’s a quiet experience.”
