Original Painting of a Mescalero Apache Warrior [SOLD]

“The two most impressive Apache artists to attend The Studio (Santa Fe Indian School) were Ignatius Palmer and Allan Houser.  Palmer possessed a distinctive sense of line and produced angular figures in a background of serenity.  The figures in his paintings seem caught in the midst of an action, still alive and warm.”  Highwater, 1976

“Ignatius Palmer, a Mescalero Apache, was born about 1921.  He was painting as early as 1939. . . but seems to have done most of his exhibiting between 1957 and 1962.  At the Scottsdale show in the latter year he received a second award for . . . a painting executed in tempera.”  Tanner, 1973

The famous Santa Fe architect, John Gaw Meem, designed a building in downtown Albuquerque for Maurice Maisel’s new trading post and asked Olive Rush to paint murals at the entrance.  She suggested she select Indian artists to paint them.  All selected were from The Studio of the Santa Fe Indian School.  They were Awa Tsireh; Popovi Da and Pop Chalee painted northern Pueblo subjects; Ben Quintana, Ku-Pe-Ru, and Joe Herrera did Keres motifs; Wilson Dewey and Ignatius Palmer added some of the Apache patterns; and Ha-So De and Harrison Begay contributed Navajo ones.  Palmer painted a Gan Dancer.  The murals still exist on the building.

 “Ignatius Palmer shows his paintings mainly in the tribal arts center near his home in the Mescalero Apache area.  Large and impressive figures of Gan Dancers and other ceremonial personages appear in flat, outlined constructions in most of these.  Palmer is one of the few Apache artists who have consistently combined painting with duties and distractions of reservation life.” Dunn, 1968

This painting of an Apache warrior was executed in casein on paper and is more animated than most Indian School student paintings; however, it is presented without surrounding landscape and sky objects, which is in the The Studio style.  The painting is signed in lower right Palmer ’66.  It is properly matted and framed and ready for display.

Condition: appears in original condition but has not been examined out of the frame

Provenance: from the collection of a Santa Fe family

References: 

- Song from the Earth: American Indian Painting by Jamake Highwater, 1976

- Southwest Indian Painting; a Changing Art by Clara Lee Tanner, 1973

- American Indian Painting of the Southwest and Plains Areas by Dorothy Dunn, 1968