Second Saturday Art Hop

Delmas Howe: The Lithographs, a show of the complete inventory of Howe’s lithographs plus a limited number of some never-before exhibited sketches, opens at RioBravoFineArt.

Although Howe’s lithographs are a lesser-known part of his oeuvre, which is almost exclusively painted canvas, his lithographs include some of his most iconic images. As Howe was learning to paint in the nineteen fifties in New York, he developed a love for the style of the École des Beaux Arts. His friend and art historian Edward Lucie-Smith encouraged Howe to paint what he knew. What Howe knew was the cowboy culture of Southern New Mexico as he was raised in Hot Springs, now Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. The paintings of the École have a strong emphasis on the classic myth stories of the Greeks and Romans. The cowboy is a mythic America figure and the American Southwest, of which New Mexico is a defining part, is the myth machine for this nation. Howe brilliantly combined these two myth strains into the major paintings of his Rodeo Pantheon series. The Rodeo Pantheon series established Howe’s career as an important artist.

Many of Howe’s lithographs very much reflect his mastery of combining the classic myth stories with the mythic aspects of the cowboy and the American West. And the mythic elements that Howe explores are a part of what has shaped the American psyche.

Howe is approaching his ninetieth birthday, and RioBravoFineArt is proud to present this unique show of his work.