Description:
Watercolor on Paper. Signed l.r.: Chief T. Saul, Stamped u.r.: PLANCHE 12.
From: American Indian Painters, Vol. 1, p. 14: An Oklahoma artists of the younger generation that is coming to the front, Chief Saul was born in 1921. He first gave evidence of creative ability at Bacone College. After service with the 45th division in Africa, Sicily, Italy, France, Belgium, Germany and Austria, he returned to Oklahoma and, like so many veterans, enrolled as a student in the University of Oklahoma School of Art. He took the prescribed courses leading to a B.F.A. degree and received his M.F.A. in 1948. In addition to this, he prepared sketches of Indian life which he submitted for suggestion and criticism. These paintings are done in a personal style which is an adaption of the manner of the Plains Indians. The subjects of these paintings, however, are the traditional Choctaw and Chickasaw customs and legends that he knows. In 1947 two of his works were exhibited in the Second Annual Exhibition of Indian art at Philbrook Art Museum, Tulsa, where he won a prize. He was singled out for special honor by the magazine "Art Digest" with a reproduction of his "Choctaw Ball Game." Chief is a talented and industrious artist. It is too early in his art career to make predictions about his future or point the direction in which his art will develop, Red or White. He appears to be intrigued by modernism in its varied manifestations. (Collection, University of Oklahoma)