Description:
Watercolor on paper. Signed l.r.: Blackbear Bosin, Stamped u.r.: PLANCHE 17.
From: American Indian Painters, Vol. 1, p. 15: In Oklahoma it is still possible to be born in an Indian tipi if one should so desire. Blackbear did in 1921. As a child, he played the usual Indian and cowboy games, but being an excellent rider, he was usually assigned the role of the cowboy fighting the Indians. Plains Indians do not like to till the soil, but at seventeen, Blackbear became a farmer, from necessity, and eked out a very meager living. Meanwhile, he painted pictures on Indian life and sold a few at a very small price. Encouraged by this, he decided to complete his education. He enrolled in High School from which he graduated in 1940. He won a University of Oklahoma scholarship for art study, but for economic reasons, he was unable to take advantage of it. He took a training course in aircraft metal work and immediately secured employment at Beachcraft [sic] in Wichita. There he was for the first time earning enough money to be able to buy books on art, Indian lore, and culture, that he had longed for all his life. The paintings that he did at this period are distinguished for their careful and painstaking accuracy of Indian costumes and customs. He volunteered in the Marines. After a year overseas, he ended up in a hospital in Hawaii where he remained for about a year. While convalescing, he had an opportunity to paint and study art under J.H. MacPherson, professor of art at University of Hawaii. He looks upon MacPherson with true Indian affection, as a wonderful person. In Hawaii, also the Honolulu Academy of Art sponsored a one-man-show of his work. After he received his discharge from the Marine Corps, he returned home with a renewed residesire to study art. But reality and ambition conflicted and it became again necessary for him to seek work. Although at present he cannot devote all his time to painting, since he has three children to support, he is making progress. His painting "Two Horsemen" is in his earlier manner. It should perhaps be called "Two Friends". One a limitless plain, two Indian riders meet. They sit most confidently and informally on their mustangs, facing each other. They appear to be in earnest conversation. One of the youngsters wears a feathered headdress and the other the buffalo cap. How splendidly the artist has emphasized the nearest figure in deeper colors, thus creating an interval of illuminated space between them. The net result produced a three-dimensional sculpturesque quality arrived at through the use of flat paint. In color, the painting is restricted to the warmer tones. It is admirably composed. (Collection, University of Oklahoma)