I grew up in Colorado but when I was young our family spent a lot of time in New Mexico. At one point our father was a professor at the University of New Mexico and he later took a sabbatical and taught in an elementary school in Albuquerque. While living there we camped, hiked, collected rocks and explored Southwest Indian ruins. I remember it was a special treat to go to the square in Santa Fe and have a great Mexican meal with sopapillas for desert. I can also recall spending hours in the art galleries looking at the bronzes of the Old Wild West and being mesmerized. I was hooked on sculptures at an early age.
I became a huge fan of the western artists Remington and Russell who made the old west come alive. I could spend hours looking at their work. I was lucky enough to have a true western artist as a junior high art teacher in the 1970s. Rudl Mergleman grew up on a ranch in the Gunnison Country and was drawn to be an artist. To this day Rudl continues to create paintings and bronzes that are inspiring. As a student, he fueled my passion and coached me as I created a few bronzes of my own. Many of my first pieces had that western influence.
In the 1970s my parents supported my passion by having several pieces cast in bronze and we still have those original pieces. As often happens life kept me busy and took me in another direction. Although I created furniture, and built several houses, I did not produce many bronzes other than a few in the late 1990s. My mother, who started the Johnson Gallery in Gunnison in the 1990s, displayed a few pieces I created in the 90s which had a new twist, they were action pieces of the new west.
I became a huge fan of the western artists Remington and Russell who made the old west come alive. I could spend hours looking at their work. I was lucky enough to have a true western artist as a junior high art teacher in the 1970s. Rudl Mergleman grew up on a ranch in the Gunnison Country and was drawn to be an artist. To this day Rudl continues to create paintings and bronzes that are inspiring. As a student, he fueled my passion and coached me as I created a few bronzes of my own. Many of my first pieces had that western influence.
In the 1970s my parents supported my passion by having several pieces cast in bronze and we still have those original pieces. As often happens life kept me busy and took me in another direction. Although I created furniture, and built several houses, I did not produce many bronzes other than a few in the late 1990s. My mother, who started the Johnson Gallery in Gunnison in the 1990s, displayed a few pieces I created in the 90s which had a new twist, they were action pieces of the new west.
Skier 1999
Tuber 1999