Philip Russell Goodwin (American, 1882-1935). Sam Houston at San Jacinto, 1907. Oil on canvas. 27-1/4 x 18 inches (69.2 ...

Description

Philip Russell Goodwin (American, 1882-1935)
Sam Houston at San Jacinto, 1907
Oil on canvas
27-1/4 x 18 inches (69.2 x 45.7 cm)
Signed and dated lower right: Philip R. Goodwin / 1907

Property from the Estate of S. Hallock du Pont, Jr.

PROVENANCE:
American Illustrators Gallery, New York;
Acquired by the present owner from the above, 1992.

LITERATURE:
E.P. Lyle, Jr., The Lone Star, New York, 1907, frontispiece, illustrated;
L.L. Peterson, Philip R. Goodwin: America's Sporting and Wildlife Artist, Missoula, Montana, 2007, p. 27, fig. 1.78, illustrated.

Sam Houston waves a saber clenched in fringed gauntlet-wearing hand and a pistol tucked in his waistband. His broad-brimmed planters hat perches on his head as he leads the charge. Interestingly, Houston rides a Mexican vaquero or hacendado-style saddle with a large horn and tapaderos on hi stirrups and wears espuelas grandes on his boots.

Phillip Russell Goodwin's painting, Sam Houston at San Jacinto, shows far more drama and action than usually found in his work. Better known for his "predicament paintings"-wherein a hunter or outdoorsman is suddenly faced with a split-second decision while facing an unexpected animal (often a bear) blocking his way or the perfect shot appears suddenly-Goodwin's paintings nearly always depict the moment just before the action occurs. In Sam Houston at San Jacinto, the viewer is placed in the action while it occurs, very much in the Howard Pyle school of thought. A line of frontiersman takes the eye into the composition to main figure-albeit in the background-of Sam Houston on one of at least two horses he rode during the battle. His left leg was shattered above the ankle and his first horse killed but he mounted a second to continue fighting during the eighteen-minute battle. Henry Millard led the infantry regiment depicted in the foreground, on the right of the artillery, under George W. Hockley. Goodwin painted the infantrymen as from all stripes, the foremost figure dressed in a Cherokee-style fringed hunting shirt (perhaps a reference to Houston's time among the Cherokees) and wearing beaded moccasins. The Texian man aiming his rifle just in front of Houston may wear a "coonskin cap" a reminder David Crockett and the defenders of the Alamo as these men charged toward Buffalo Bayou. All the Texian army soldiers carry flintlock rifles, powder horns, and shot pouches.

In good legendary fashion, the Texian troops carry the highly recognizable Lone Star State flag. However, volunteers from Kentucky commanded by Sidney Sherman, called the Newport Rifles Company, carried the only battle flag that day. Called the San Jacinto Battle Flag, the Newport Rifles flag was made of silk and adorned with a painting of Lady Liberty. It is unlikely that Goodwin or the author of the The Lone Star novel, Dallas born Eugene P. Lyle Jr., knew that piece of San Jacinto history.

Goodwin aligned his Texian troops in a compositional diagonal into the depicted field, leading directly to Houston. Following the admonitions of his mentor Pyle, he also added feeling and emotion to the highly charged action. The fury of the Texians screaming "Remember the Alamo!" and "Remember Goliad!" renders to scene raw with emotion on this fateful day in Texas history.

Born at Norwich, Connecticut, Phillip Russell Goodwin studied anatomy at the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, then drawing at Drexel Institute of Art, Science, and Industry (now Drexel University) in Philadelphia in 1898 and 1900. He studied painting under Howard Pyle from 1900 to 1903 alongside contemporaries N.C. Wyeth, Harvey Dunn, Frank Schoonover, Violet Oakley, among others. Considered the "father of American illustration," Howard Pyle (1853-1911) brought the quality and respectability of American illustration to new heights at the turn of the 20th Century. Pyle felt that illustration was the truest American art form and stressed "American themes" in published illustrations. In 1900 Pyle, recognizing Goodwin's raw talent, selected him to attend Pyle's summer classes at Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, and his winter classes at the Howard Pyle School of Art, in Wilmington, Delaware. Pyle felt young Goodwin "[would] achieve marked if not great success in his art, both as a painter and an illustrator. He possesses a strong artistic sense and is exactly the right age to be taught. I do not want him to do something that the critical world will regard as good or fairly good, but something that will attract remark and notice."

In 1903 Goodwin moved his New York City studio to West 23rd Street in 1903 and met Charles M. and Nancy Russell. Their friendship would dramatically affect both artists' work. Beginning with a 1905 trip to Colorado, Goodwin sketched, hunted, fished, packed, and canoed in remote parts of the American West and Canada until 1914, providing him material he used throughout his career. Cowboys, American Indians, and frontiersmen shared the stage with hunters, wildlife, and outdoorsmen in his paintings until about 1915, when his paintings shifted almost exclusively to scenes in the North Woods. Goodwin provided illustrations for Harpers, Colliers, Outing, Scribner's, Outdoor Life, Saturday Evening Post, and McClure's, magazines, Brown & Bigelow calendar company and many others. Goodwin's paintings appeared on everything from puzzles to ink blotters, magazines to matchbook covers. Calendars and reproductions of his work hung in auto and barber shops, hardware and feed stores, bunkhouses, and hunting lodges, across the United States and Canada. His friends included some of this country's greatest artists and celebrities Charlie Russell, Carl Rungius, W. Herbert "Buck" Dunton, and Teddy Roosevelt. Goodwin became the artist whose work was recognized everywhere, but no one knew his name. Though never truly impoverished or out of work, even during the Depression, financial concerns plagued him throughout his life. Philip R. Goodwin died of pneumonia in his studio at age 54.


More information about Philip Russell Goodwin. See also: Goodwin, Philip Russell Artist.

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