The cowboy occupies a strange place within American culture. On one hand, the cowboy is part of the mythology of the West, a fable of man’s connection to the land and the creatures in it. On the other, cowboys are not some dusty old book on a shelf somewhere. They are alive, here and now—they’re saddling up their horses as you read this very sentence. 

Bruce Greene paints both cowboys: the ones of our imaginations and the blue-collar workers out there tending the pastures today. And in both versions, the Texas artist honors them with every brushstroke. “As long as people eat beef we’ll have cowboys. Those guys are out there, whether you’ve seen them or not,” he says. “I’ve ridden with them and
I consider them friends. The American cowboy is iconic. It is lasting. It is not going away.”

The Texas artist will be showing his newest collection of cowboy works at a major solo show titled The Early Hours, opening February 5 at InSight Gallery in Fredericksburg, Texas. Gallery owner Elizabeth Harris has been astounded at Greene’s output as he churns work out of his studio. “He’s a man on a mission,” she said in the lead-up to the show. “And he seems especially excited in the work. We’re getting new paintings in big batches.”As Sunrise Seeks the Riders, oil, 38 x 38”

The work certainly has something to do with his excitement, but so does the last 12 months, which has seen a tremendous amount of personal growth for the artist—even amid a pandemic that has proven difficult to work around. In the winter of 2020, Greene’s time in the studio was reduced due to a debilitating back injury. He didn’t dare even get on a horse. The recovery was slow, but as his strength returned his studio once again sprung to life. By October, at the Cowboy Artists of America’s annual trail ride held at the Spade Ranch on the Texas Panhandle, Greene was back on a horse and riding out with the other cowboys. “It felt good to get back out,” he adds.Out from the Oak Mott, oil, 40 x 40”

The artist lives on a gorgeous piece of Hill Country between Clifton and Cranfills Gap in central Texas. He and his wife, Janie, moved there in 1991 and immediately began restoring an 1883 Norwegian farmstead that is now their home. The studio, which was built later, is about 100 yards from the house. The 1,200-square-foot building has a porch with cedar posts, skylights, a wood stove for the winter and dedicated areas for painting and sculpture with north-facing windows in each. He couldn’t ask for a better studio, but he also points out that the studio does not make the art.Cold Morning on the Caprock, oil, 15½ x 15½”

“My first studio was in our house, which was about 1,150 square feet, and that included the garage. It was just a normal house on a street in the Dallas area. Janie kept six kids, including one of our own, in a daycare there while I worked in a spare bedroom,” Greene recalls. “Later I rented a place, but there was one problem: there was no working bathroom. So when I had to use the restroom I had to walk down the road to a store. I guess you could say that was humble beginnings.”Saddle House Light, oil, 30 x 30”

He continues: “My career has been marked by these wonderful opportunities. One time a guy called me because he had built an outdoor shopping center…and he wanted a piece for outside there near the parking area. He wanted four lifesize guys around a campfire and another guy on a horse. ‘Can you do that in six months?’ he asked. I told him I thought we could do that. But as soon as I got off the phone, I had to figure out how to do it. So that’s what we did—we just figured it out as best we could,” Greene says. “At the time, the Bosque Arts Center had furnished me in a studio, but the studio was on the second floor. So as I finished those pieces we had to carry them all down the stairs.”
Since then, Greene has become one of the top cowboy painters and sculptors in America. His works have won awards at the annual CA shows, they appear in museums around the country and his bronze monuments occupy some prestigious places, including at the Alamo. But as recognizable his work is, Greene does very few major solo shows, which is why The Early Hours represents such an important period for him and his work.

“I have been busy, not that there’s anything else to do right now anyway,” he says, hinting at the pandemic and the closures of museums and other art venues. “The good thing for me was I started early and really planned for it. And now I feel good about it. I haven’t been rushed, and I’ve been able to really see the paintings and bronzes as they get done and wait in my studio. Having them sit around for awhile really makes you look at them differently.”A Little Cinchy, bronze, 17 x 15 x 10”

The InSight show will feature 20 new paintings and two bronzes, one of which is a smaller piece. Works include Sunrise Seeks the Riders, showing a group of riders meeting on their horses before the morning round-up, and Saddle House Light, which shows a cowboy tending to his horse next to an open barn door and glowing light that fills the space. In Out from the Oak Mott, a cowboy’s horse jumps back as it encounters a whitetail deer that was hidden in the brush. “This rider is running down this calf and busts this deer out of there. He’s riding a colt, so this colt blows up on this hill there. If you look real closely you can see the doe back in the brush there,” Greene says. “It’s pieces like this that can be really timeless, but I also want to be accurate to whatever time period I’m painting, so you won’t see a modern saddle with a historic cowboy. Sometimes those details are subtle, but people notice them, even though the job of cowboying hasn’t changed a whole lot over the last 100 years.”

Just like the cowboys he paints, Greene thinks cowboy art has the power to remain in the American mythology. “For me, Western art stays fresh. There are always new looks, new directions, new approaches. And that’s the exciting part of Western art. I’ve been around a long time and I still find stories to tell, stories that are still touching people and connecting with them. And I’m still having fun. Sometimes I forget how old I am because this job can still be so much fun.”—

Bruce Green: The Early Hours
February 5-26, 2021
InSight Gallery, 214 W. Main Street, Fredericksburg, TX 78624
(830) 997-9920, www.insightgallery.com

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