Michael Cassidy says, “The West is a place but also a state of mind.” He lives in the Oregon Outback where cowboy life still exists. Like many of us, he grew up with the Western imagery of cowboys and Indians fueling ideas and stories of the romance of the West while concealing its harsher realities.
Spicy Stories, oil on linen, 70 x 48”
Later, with a background in commercial illustration, he appreciated the graphic quality of Western movie posters. The over-the-top illustrations on the covers of Western pulp fiction from before World War II inspired him to make his own stories with his own images, blowing the paper novels up to movie poster size.
The Danger Trail, Star Western, charcoal pencil on paper, 19 x 12"
He relates how he was a sign painter to earn his way through college and recalls that the iconic Western painter Maynard Dixon was also a sign painter. He refutes the opinion of some that graphic art is a lesser art, declaring, “Illustration is as beautiful an art as any other art.”
Texas Rangers, oil on linen, 75 x 34”
The graphic beauty of his paintings is complemented by his energetic application of paint, whether in the more than 6-foot-tall dime novel cover Texas Rangers or the more intimate 12-by-9-inch character study Arizona Cowhand, Cochise County.
The exhibition Michael Cassidy: Cowboy Storieswill be shown at Gerald Peters Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico, from June 30 through September 30. It will feature at least four large Western pulp paintings, and then four to five smaller Western portraits and five drawings.
Arizona Cowhand, Cochise County, oil on linen, 12 x 9”
“There’s a reason why Western art is still popular more than 120 years after the heyday of its subject matter,” Cassidy says. “However, the myth and the reality of the West are two different things. The reality was a beautiful but wild, harsh, brutal and unforgiving environment for all concerned. The myth is what Hollywood and Western pulp fiction chose to promote. In our Western stories, real and imagined, we see ourselves as we would like to be seen.” —
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