Velox Benjamin Ward (American, 1901-1994). The Cows Won't Come Home. Oil on Masonite. 18 x 24 inches (45.7 x 61.0 cm). S...

Description

Velox Benjamin Ward (American, 1901-1994)
The Cows Won't Come Home
Oil on Masonite
18 x 24 inches (45.7 x 61.0 cm)
Signed lower right: Velox / Ward

PROVENANCE:
Valley House Gallery, Dallas;
Acquired by the present owner from the above.

EXHIBITED:
Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, "Velox Ward," May 11-June 11, 1972;
Witte Memorial Museum, San Antonio, Texas, "Velox Ward," July 1-September 1, 1972;
Wichita Falls Museum and Art Center, Wichita Falls, Texas, "Velox Ward," September 15-November 1, 1972;
Amarillo Art Center Museum, Amarillo, Texas, "Velox Ward," November 15, 1972-January 15, 1973;
Tyler Museum of Art, Tyler, Texas, "Velox Ward," February 15-April 1, 1973;
Corpus Christi Museum, Corpus Christi, Texas, "Velox Ward," April 10-June 1, 1973;
Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, Dallas, Texas, "Velox Ward," June 16-July 29, 1973;
Longview Museum and Arts Center, Longview, Texas, October 1980.

LITERATURE:
Donald and Margaret Vogel, Velox Ward, exhibition catalogue, Fort Worth, Texas, 1972, p. 73.


During the 1930s and 1940s, American artists and critics sought "authenticity" in American art and some even began painting in a self-conscious and obvious naïve style. Self-taught painters such as Anna Mary "Grandma" Moses in New York, Clara McDonald "Aunt Clara" Williamson, H. O. "Cowboy" Kelly in Texas, and Augusta Isabel Corson Metcalfe Metcalfe in Oklahoma, caught the public's attention in the 1950s and 1960s, resulting in museum and gallery exhibitions of their work. Nearly all practiced some form of what came to be called "memory painting," some form of resurrected reminiscences of nostalgic, often rural and agricultural times. They also tended to start making art fairly late in their lives. Velox Ward, Sr. followed this same pattern in the 1960s.

A self-taught memory painter, Ward began painting at age 59 at the request of his family. Like many other great Folk artists, Ward turned to his memories of growing up in rural East Texas during the early part of the twentieth century. He is known for youthful recollections of his community, including outdoor scenes of ginning cotton, tending a garden, butchering meat, and napping on the porch. Unlike most other memory painters, he refused to rely on the idealized nostalgia of days gone by and strove to infuse his work with as much realism as possible.

By the 1970s, the North Texas arts community was beginning to recognize Ward's potential, including Donald and Margaret Vogel of Valley House Gallery, Dallas and the Amon Carter Museum of Western Art (now the Amon Carter Museum of American Art), Fort Worth. In 1972, they arranged for an exhibition of his work at the Amon Carter that then traveled to the Wichita Falls Museum, the Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi, and the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts (now the Dallas Museum of Art). Currently, Velox Ward's work is found in the Amon Carter, Dallas Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the National Gallery of Art, and other public and private collections.




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