New exhibit at Abraham Art Gallery featuring variety of styles, media opens Tuesday

PLAINVIEW — Abraham Art Gallery opens 2024 with "The Wayland Collection: Selected Works," which will be on display from Jan. 16 through March 22.

The exhibit features purchased and donated art collected through the years, including local and regional artists, several Wayland alumni and renowned artists from around the world, many of whom were drawn to the beauty of the Southwestern culture and landscape. The range of art media featured in the collection’s selected works include oil and acrylic painting, printmaking, photography, sculpture and carving, mixed media, and watercolor.

Among the featured artists are Porfirio Salinas, 1910-1973; Sandra Bowden, 1943-present; Joan Miró, 1893-1983; and John Young-Hunter, 1874-1955.

Located on the atrium level of the Mabee Learning Resources Center on Wayland Baptist University’s Plainview campus, Abraham Art Gallery is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 2 to 5 p.m. Friday and Saturday. For more information or to schedule a group tour, patrons can call the gallery at 806-291-3710.

Below is more about some of the artists featured in the exhibit.

Porfirio Salinas

Hill country artist Porfirio Salinas lived most of his life in San Antonio and was largely self-taught as a painter. He learned through observing other artists. Salinas also studied under Robert Wood, a prolific landscape painter, who paid his apprentice to paint bluebonnets on his canvases because Wood despised painting the flowers.

Serving in the army for two years at Fort Sam Houston, Salinas was commissioned to paint murals for the officers’ lounge. He achieved a popular following among many Texans, including President Lyndon B. Johnson, who began to collect Salinas’ work in the 1940s. This increased the artist’s popularity beyond Texas, and he was honored for having “done much to bring the culture of Mexico and Texas closer together” through his artwork.

Salinas dedicated himself to painting landscapes of Central Texas, particularly the bluebonnets that grow in abundance during the spring.

Sandra Bowden

A visual artist, painter and art collector that was born in Massachusetts, Sandra Bowden has been interpreting scripture and her own spiritual walk through mixed media for more than 40 years.

Acclaimed as one of the most unique, impressive and inspiring Christian artists in America, Bowden’s work has been featured in books, magazines and gallery shows across the United States, Canada, Italy and Jerusalem. She holds a degree from the State University of New York and was president of Christians in The Visual Arts from 1993 to 2007.

Her work fuses the vivid yet traditional imagery of the Old Testament — stone tablets and artifacts, Hebrew inscriptions, architectural depictions — with images of Christ’s passion and God’s natural creations. Bowden says she approaches the creation of her work as a prayer or conversation with God, translating theological ideas of God’s glory and creativity into visual form. Bowden has also been invited to show at the Jubilee in the Vatican this year.

Joan Miró

A new artist in the Wayland Collection, Joan Miró was born in Barcelona, Spain and was a contemporary of Pablo Picasso and Paul Cézanne.

Miró began seriously studying art after a nervous breakdown at the age of 14. He was unafraid to use unconventional materials as a means of achieving his own symbolic language rather than depending on traditional realism, and he is one of the prominent pioneers of surrealism. Elements of his vibrant style include Cubism, Fauvism and Surrealism.

Miró sold a painting celebrating his Catalan heritage to Ernest Hemingway, who loved the piece for its unique blend of carefully detailed realism set against the biomorphic spatial abstraction of Cubism. His lithograph, "Plate 5," was donated by Mr. and Mrs. Randy Koffman.

John Young-Hunter

The son of Colin Hunter, a celebrated marine painter and member of the Royal Academy of London, artist John Young-Hunter grew up with influences like John Singer Sargent, whom he later studied.

Although a recognized painter by 1912 with paintings in the National Tate Gallery, London, and the Musée de Luxembourg, Paris, Young-Hunter cut all ties to come to America with no credentials other than a letter of introduction to the American Indians given to him by his friend the Duke of Argyll. He soon discovered Taos, New Mexico, where he played a prominent role in the art community, constructing “an elegant Spanish studio with a British accent.” He spent winters at his other studio in New York City, which hosted a continuous procession of distinguished figures, many of whom he painted.

A skilled portraitist, Young-Hunter left a diverse collection of paintings depicting frontier life in the Old West, the American Indian culture, flowers, and landscapes.

This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: New exhibit at Abraham Art Gallery features variety of styles, media