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Warning: Uninitialized string offset 0 in /opt/bitnami/wordpress/wp-includes/widgets/class-wp-widget-text.php on line 1 Two by Two: Animal Pairs | MKBMA | 2021Skip to content
Garcia’s stylized duck is modeled on ancient ceremonial effigy vessels that feature human, animal, or zoomorphic (mixed) shapes. Effigy bowls were ceremonial and often used to hold burial goods. Garcia’s is decorated with a geometric black on white design inspired by the pottery of the Mimbres, ancestors of the Acoma. The duck has varied associations among Pueblo peoples. “Pawick” is the Hopi Duck Katsina, one of many spirits representing natural aspects of the real world. In Zuni beliefs, the duck is a fetish for the spirits of those who have passed on, making its image appropriate for a bowl used as part of a burial ceremony.
John Frederick Helm, Jr.
Born 1900, Syracuse, New York
Died 1972, Manhattan, Kansas
Mallard, ca. 1939
Aquatint with drypoint
Gift of Mary Brownell Helm, 1985.115
The Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) is the ancestor of nearly all domestic ducks and is found almost everywhere. Like many “dabbling ducks” that feed on the water’s surface, its body is long and its tail rides high out of the water. Helm’s realistic depiction of a male Mallard lacks color, but the breed’s distinctive markings are evident: Males have a dark, iridescent-green head and bright yellow bill, and a gray body sandwiched between a brown breast and black rear. The bodies of females and juveniles are mottled brown with orange-brown bills. Both sexes have an iridescent blue “speculum” patch of color on the wing.
Franz Van Leemputten
Born 1850, Werchter, Belgium
Died 1914, Antwerp, Belgium
Shepherdess, late 19th century
Oil on canvas
1968.7
Van Leemputten’s bucolic scene of a shepherdess with her flock is a common eighteenth and nineteenth subject in art. Idealized, the pasture and its denizens reflect a nostalgia for rural life during a period of industrialization and urbanization. Unlike other grazing animals, sheep(Ovis aries) require constant attention, hence the need for someone to watch over them.Because of their herd mentality, they often follow each other blindly into dangerous situations.
John Steuart Curry
Born 1897, Dunavant, Kansas
Died 1946, Madison Wisconsin
Sheep Field Hillside, 1924
Watercolor with graphite on paper
Bequest of Kathleen G. Curry, 2002.1484
Curry likely chose the subject of sheep because of his farm roots. He may have been intrigued by this flock in New York State, where he was vacationing, because of controversies related to the animal in his home state of Kansas. After their introduction to Kansas in the 1870s,sheep became a source of contention amonglandowners. Many thought that sheep grazing habits ruined pastures for cattle. This led to fencing off of pastureland among neighbors.
Grace Thurston Arnold Albee
Born 1890, Scituate, Rhode Island
Died 1985,Bristol, Rhode Island
A Peaceful Afternoon, 1943
Wood engraving
Gift of John Cranston Heintzelman, 1965.10
Albee’s goat appears peaceful, but its surroundings are chaotic. The domestic goat (Capra aegagrus hircusis) is naturally curious, likes to climb, and is notorious for escaping its enclosure. A quick climb up the debris, and this goat would be free.
Pablo Picasso
Born 1881, Málaga, Spain
Died 1973, Mougins, France
Tête de Chevre de Profil, 1952
Painted and partially glazed stoneware
Gift of Ruth Miller, 1993.11
Picasso depicted goats in many different mediums. He had a pet goat named Esmeralda, which he won as a prize in a local French lottery.He would describe at length how he adored this goat, despite its unruly behavior. As someone who avoided convention himself, Picasso may have identified with this maverick animal.The goat on his plate seems to have a mischievous twinkle in its wide–open eye.
Nora Othic
Born 1954, San Francisco, California
Small White Rabbit, 2006
Pastel on paper
Acquisition made possible with funds provided by the Friends of the Beach Museum of Art, 2006.89
Othic says she has felt a connection to farm animals since she was a child, seeing them as a bridge between humans and the rest of the natural world. The artist was raised on a farm and still lives on one. She goes to the Missouri State Fair in Sedalia every year to take reference photos for her drawings. Her quiet portraits present each animal as unique. Rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus) are a favorite subject.
Imao Keinen
Born 1845, Kyoto, Japan
Died 1924, Kyoto, Japan
Two Rabbits in Moonlight, early 20th century
Woodblock print with watercolor on paper
S21.2017
Keinen is well-known for his kacho-e (images of birds and flowers), so this rabbit is a departure. By placing these rabbits under a full moon, Keinen may be referencing the moon rabbit or moon hare. In Japanese lore, a rabbit uses a mortar and pestle to pound rice for mochi, a chewy New Year treat, and the rabbit’s shape can be seen in the dark markings of the moon.
Leo Meissner
Born 1895, Detroit, Michigan
Died 1977, Portland, Maine
Watchful Waiting, 1937
Wood engraving
Acquisition made possible with funds provided by Ron and Mary Andersen, 1996.25
The Scotty featured in Meissner’s print is formally known as the Scottish or Aberdeen Terrier. The first written records ofthis breed of dog (Canis lupus familiaris) date from 1436, when Don Leslie described it in his book,The History of Scotland1436–1561. When King James VI became James I of England during the seventeenth century, he sent six terriersto a French monarch as a gift.His love and adoration for the breed increased its popularity throughout the world.
Clara Tice
Born 1888, Elmira, New York
Died 1973, Forest Hills, New York
Pekinese, 20th century
Etching
Bequest of Raymond and Melba Budge, 1992.221
Pekinese dogs originated in China and were favored by royalty. The name comes from Peking (Beijing), where the royal Forbidden City was located. Chinese legend says a lion and a marmoset fell in love, but the lion was too large. The lion went to the Buddha and told him of his woes. The Buddha allowed the lion to shrink down to the size of the marmoset, and the Pekingese was the result. The Pekinese did not feature in Tice’s 1940 book, ABC Dogs—a Poodlebeat it out for the letter P.
Norman Akers (Osage Nation and Pawnee)
Born 1958, Fairfax, Oklahoma
Ships of Change, 2008
Monotype
Friends of the Beach Museum of Art Kansas Art Fund, 2012.148
Native American creation stories tell of how the earth was formed by piling soil on the back of a great sea turtle. Many indigenous tribes still refer to North America as Turtle Island. Akers’ art is often collage-like and filled with symbolic imagery that is sometimes connected to Native beliefs and sometimes open to interpretation. In this case, the turtle might be understood as the original “ship,” seen alongside early European sailingvessels.
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Mary Singer
Born 1936, Santa Clara Pueblo, New Mexico
Turtle, 1976
Black on black earthenware
Gift of Mary Cottom, 2014.438
Singer created this turtle (order Testudines) in the famous polished blackware pottery tradition of the Santa Clara Pueblo. The turtle in Southwest tribes such as the Hopi and Navajo represents water, a precious commodity in the region.
Louis ShipShee (Prairie Band Potawatomi)
Born 1896, Prairie Band Potawatomi Reservation, Kansas
Died 1975, Topeka, Kansas
Young Male Bison, mid-20th century
Oil on canvas
Gift of Donald Lambert, 2014.169
ShipShee’s portrait of the American Bison (Bison bison) honors the animal critical to the survival of Native peoples living on the Great Plains during the nineteenth century. In addition to providing large quantities of meat, bison yielded hides for shelter and clothing, dung for fuel, horns and bones for tools and utensils, bladders for containers, hair for rope, and sinews for bowstrings. While ShipShee was born after the near-extinction of the Bison, the animal would have been an important part of his cultural heritage.
Patricia DuBose Duncan
Born 1932, Nashville, Tennessee
Bison and Magpie, 1991
Photocopy collage with colored pencil and charcoal on paper
Gift of the artist, 1998.56
During the 1990s Duncan used her photography and mixed-media compositions to support the preservation of Kansas prairies. She played an instrumental role in the establishment of the Tall Grass Prairie National Preserve north of Strong City, Kansas, in 1996. One aim of the prairie movement in Kansas was to rejuvenate the bison population, which had been decimated by white hunters during the second half of the nineteenth century. Only 550 of the animals remained in 1889. Today bison number more than 400,000 in North America. Most of these prairie-preserving herbivores roam in publicly owned parks such as the Konza Prairie outside of Manhattan, Kansas, which currently has a herd of 286. An increasing number of bison are also raised on private ranches.
Sven Birger Sandzén
Born 1871, Blidsberg, Sweden
Died 1954, Lindsborg, Kansas
Study of a Camel, 1920
Lithograph
1984.26
Sandzén’s camel, like Doyle’s, is the single hump Dromedary (Camelus dromedarius) native to the deserts of the Arabian Peninsula.Contrary to common belief, camels do not store water in their humps; their humps contain fatty tissue that when metabolizedwill yield the animal a small amount of water.
John Doyle
Born 1939, Chicago, Illinois
Died 2010, Burnsville, North Carolina
Bedouin, from the seriesThe Great Human Race, 1978
Lithograph
Gift of Phillip and Linda Energren, 2017.3fff
Doyle’smulti-part suite of prints,The Great Human Race, is an anthropological presentation of world cultures and their contributions. The artist wrote of his camel–riding Bedouin, “The precursors of the Islamic Armies that spread the word of Allah throughout the Middle East, Africa and parts of Europe, were the nomadic warriors of the Arabian Desert, known as the [Bedouins]. These roving warriors’ loyalties were to his clan and tribe and had a fatalistic submission to their destiny.” The Bedouin’s mount, a camel, is often called “The Ship of the Desert.” It played a key role in early trade along the Silk Road, carrying goods as well as people.
Margaret (Marge) Ponce Israel
Born 1928, Havana, Cuba
Died 1987, New York, New York
Chickens, 1978
Lithograph
Gift of Gilbert E. Johnson, 2017.81
Israel lived and worked in a three-story building in Manhattan, New York, that was once a horse stable. Her menagerie included a bantam rooster, guinea hens, doves, a rabbit, dogs, and a cat. These creatures were featured in a posthumous exhibition of her work called “A Domestic Bestiary” in1997-1998. The artist’s colorful palette for her chickens(Gallus gallusdomesticus)can be connected to her Cuban origins.
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Angelo C. Garzio
Born 1922, Mirabello Sannitico, Campobasso, Italy
Died 2008, Manhattan, Kansas
Pitcher, second half of 20th century
Glazed stoneware
Gift of the estate of Angelo Garzio, 2014.164
Garzio taught ceramics at Kansas State University beginning in 1957 and had a tree farm outside of Manhattan. Many of his ceramicworks feature stylized animals. In addition to the rooster featured here, the artistoften depictedfish and bulls.
Margaret Evelyn Whittemore
Born 1897, Topeka, Kansas
Died 1983, Sarasota, Florida
Red-Winged Blackbird, mid-20th century
Screenprint
2015.160
Whittemore created numerousimages for the 1932 book Bird Notes, by H.L. Rhodes, and was a contributing artist to Audubon magazine. She and fellow Kansas artist Avis Chitwood traveled the state in 1941 to record flowers, trees, and birds. According to Rhodes’ book, the migratory red-winged blackbird arrives in Kansas in March.
Ellen Lanyon
Born 1926,Chicago, Illinois
Died 2013, New York, New York
Redwinged Blackbirds, 1997-2007
Lithograph
Gift of the artist, 2009.99
Lanyon’s print features a male and female pair of Red-winged Blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus). As is typical with birds, the male is far more colorful than the female. The female of the species shows just a hint of color on her wings.
Dorothy Pulis Lathrop
Born 1891, Albany, New York
Died 1981, Falls Village, Connecticut
Gold Fish, 1944-45
Wood engraving
Gift of the family of E. Herbert Deines, 1969.124a
Lathrop wasa Caldecott-winning illustrator and printmaker whose specialty was animals. She was known to spend hours with her subjects. Her gold fish(Carassius auratus), drawn from a menagerie she and her sister kept, is shown in a well-decorated aquarium. Lathrop purchased the gold fish to be her modelforthe illustrations she created for a 1939 edition ofThe Little Mermaid.
Roger Bezombes
Born 1913, Paris, France
Died 1994, Paris, France
Poisson Verte, ca. 1972
Screenprint with plastic addition on paper
Gift of Gilbert E. Johnson, 2017.21
Bezombes made theragged fish in this print, built from a collage of colors, the subject of a bronze platter. The fish on the platter has a fake eyeball that mimics the googly eye of the creature in this print, who movesunder shapes resembling sea foam. The artist’s fish were seen all over France during the 1970s on posters for businesses like the French Railway and Air France.
Caroline Thorington
Born 1943, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Pronghorns, from the series Natural History, 1984
Lithograph
Gift of Caroline Thorington, 2017.296
Thorington’s racing Pronghorns(Antilocapra americana) areoften mistakenly referred to as the American or Prairie Antelope because of their resemblance to early Afro-Eurasian species. Lewis and Clark misidentified the animal during their early nineteenth-century expeditionacross North America. They nonetheless aptly visualizedthe power of the animals’ movement, as depicted in Thorington’s print: “Of all the animals we have seen the Antelope seems to possess the most wonderful fleetness. Shy and timorous they generally repose only on the ridges, which command a view of all the approaches of an enemy … When they first see the hunters they run with great velocity.”
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Bamana People, Mali
Chi Wara (Tyi Wara) headpiece, early 20th century
Wood
S3.2021
Bamana mythology recounts how the heroic Chi Wara, a half-antelope and half-human figuretaught agriculture to man. Pairs of male and female Chi Waraheadpiecesare worn by young farmers in a dance that takes place in the fields. Male farmers pierce the earth with their sowing sticks to make it fertile for the growing season, while a chorus of women follows, singing praises to the ideal farmer.
This headpiece represents a male antelope, but it also has the body of an aardvark, whose habit of burrowing into the earth mimics a farmer sowing the fields. The zigzag path of the mane represents the sun’s rays and the horns symbolize a stalk of millet, a staple of the Bamana diet. The headpiece was originally attached to a basket-shaped hat which had long raffia fringe cascading around the wearer, symbolizing water flowing down to the earth.
Animals have long been the subject of history, myth, and legend. Aurochs and Wooly Mammoths painted on the walls of the caves of Lascaux in France, hint at the hunting methods of prehistoric people. Animalistic deities populate ancient mythology, including the Egyptian god Horus with the head of a falconand the Greek god Zeus who visits earth as a swan. In Native American legends, animals represent spiritual concepts, such as the turtlewho is a symbol of mother earth. Noah is said to have loaded his ark with creatures, “two by two,” before the great Biblical flood.
This exhibition features such storied animals, as well as livestock, pets, and circus performers. Each image provides a chance to learn more about world cultures, literature, and science.
As you view the animal pairs, we invite you to think about who created the image and why. What techniques and materials did the artist use? How do the animals in each set compare to each other? Does one animal speak to you in a special way?
This exhibition complements The American Library Association Summer 2021 reading theme, “Tales and Tails.”
—Kathrine Schlageck, Associate Curator of Education
Adam, Jr. and his father were known for their paintings of animals, primarily the livestock on their farm in Scotland. Adam Jr. served in the British Army during World War I. He may have encountered the Chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) during his war travels, but more than likely he saw this closest animal relative to humans in a zoo. The Scottish National Zoological Park (now the Edinburgh Zoo) opened in 1913.
Jacqueline Bishop
Born 1955, Long Beach, California
The Offering, 2017
Linocut
Gift of Joe and Barb Zanatta, 2018.371
Bishop has made a career of painting flora and fauna in an effort to connect people with the natural world. During an Amazon painting expedition, she encountered Spider Monkeys (Ateles fusciceps) caged in the zoo of a luxury hotel in the jungle region of Manaus, Brazil. Free Spider Monkeys from the surrounding jungle would visit the caged monkeys on the hotel premises, something that made the artist sad. Bishop has written: “Spider Monkeys are wonderful, energetic creatures and their tail is used as an arm or leg making them look like spiders with five legs. The contrast of seeing them in a cage AND in the natural world was sobering. It wasn’t right.”
Jamie (James Browning) Wyeth
Born 1946, Wilmington, Delaware
Moon and the Horse, 1978
Lithograph
Gift of Gilbert E. Johnson, 2017.71
Wyeth follows in the footsteps of generationsof artists in his family, including his father Andrew Wyeth and grandfather, illustrator N.C. Wyeth. Animals on the Wyeth farm, “The Mill,” in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, provide inspiration for Jamie’s work. His realistic portrait of a piebald horse(Equus ferus caballus), with vivid markings and delicately detailed hair and muscles, features a facial expression that seems almost human. Horse lovers will recognize the irregular overo black and white pattern on the animal.
Lester Wilton Raymer
Born 1907, Alva, Oklahoma
Died 1991, Lindsborg, Kansas
Poster for Svensk Hyllningsfest, 1985
Photomechanical offset print
Gift of Carol and Jerry Exline, 1996.74
Raymer’s poster for Svensk Hyllningsfest, a Swedish holiday, features a Dalecarlian (Dala Horse), which originated in the Dalarna province of Sweden. Originally used as a toy, the carved wooden horse has become a symbol of Sweden andthe mascot ofUS towns founded by Swedes, including Raymer’s Lindsborg, Kansas. A red horse with brightly painted details is the most common Dala style. Visitors can buy a hand-crafted Dala horse or view giant ones decorated by local artists along the main street in Lindsborg.
Charles Malcom Campbell
Born 1905, Dayton, Ohio
Died 1985, Phoenix, Arizona
Standing Bear, from the portfolio Linoleum Cuts of Yellowstone National Park, ca. 1935
Linocut
S6d.2015
Campbell created a set of prints related to Yellowstone National Park, which featured animals and landmarks. Yellowstone is home to two species of bears: Grizzly Bears (Ursus arctos horribilis), shown here, and the smallerAmerican Black Bear (Ursus americanus). There were 728 Grizzlies living in Yellowstone at last count.
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Elmer (Elk) Red Starr (Sioux Nation)
Born 1937, Wisconsin or South Dakota
Died 2018, Santa Clara Pueblo, New Mexico
Miniature jar, mid-20th century
Black and black earthenware
Gift of Mel and Mary Cottom, 2012.220
Red Starr married a Santa Clara Pueblo potter and learned how to make traditional pottery from his wife and mother-in-law, which hedecorated with sgraffito (incised or etched) designs. Many of Red Starr’s pots feature stylized or naturalistic bears and bear claws. Among the Pueblo tribes, bears are considered one of the six directional guardians, associated with the west and the color blue. The Zunis ascribe healing powers to the powerful bear, as well asprotection and good luck.
Robert Stackhouse
Born 1942, Bronxville, New York
Ruby Lawrence, 1995
Lithograph
E. Johnson Art Acquisition Fund, 2002.343
Stackhouse’s crimson snake could be one of several snakes that arepermanently red or mature through a red phase. These include the Corn Snake, the Mangrove Salt Marsh Snake, or the Red Belly Snake. While snakes arouse an ingrained fear in some of us, Stackhouse’s richly textured Ruby Lawrence is quiet and beautiful.
Tony Fitzpatrick
Born 1958, Chicago, Illinois
Jerusalem, 2002
Etching and aquatint
2002.545
With two tails and no heads, Fitzpatrick’s snake bears a whimsical pattern that might have been inspired by many snakes. It was created as a cover for singer–songwriter Steve Earle’s albumJerusalem.
Shirley Smith
Born 1929, Whitewater, Kansas
Died 2013, New York, New York
Pink Ears, 2007
Inkjet print
Gift of the artists, 2007.86
A graduate of Kansas State University, Smith embarked on a career as an actress in New York City before becoming a multi-media artist. During the 1980s she spent summers living in a vacation trailer near her hometown of Whitewater, thirty miles northeast of Wichita,creating art inspired by the rural scenesaround her. Her multi-media installation I Love Pigswas featured at the Beach Museum of Art in 1999 and included painted portraits, videos, and sculptural wire drawings. Smith said, “Pigs especially have great personalities. Their almost human eyes seem to really look at you and make contact. … They seem to enjoy your company and reciprocate it back in such a personal, funny way. At least that’s how I like to read it.”
Harry Herman Wickey
Born 1892, Stryker, Ohio
Died 1968, Cornwall Landing, New York
Sultry August Afternoon(Piglets and Sow), 1935-36
Lithograph
Friends of the Beach Museum of Art Purchase, 2005.43
Wickey grew up on an Ohio farm. His studies with Social Realist artists in New York influenced his focus on the American Scene and expressive use of line in rendering his subjects. Wickey created a series of pig lithographs while on the family farm in 1935-36. At the time, he was recovering from the effects of nitric acid fumes used for printmaking on his eyes. Art critic and historian Thomas Craven said of Wickey’s pig (Sus domesticus) series, “The artist has captured the very essence of swinishness: each of these porkers is Very Hog of Very Hog.”
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Artist unknown
Dragon, 19th century
Bronze with rock crystal
Bequest of the John H. Kohn Collection, 1992.1
The legendary Chinese Dragon, also known as Lung, is often shown holding a pearl. In this case it bears spherical crystals. As a symbol of Chinese royalty, the image of Lungcould only be worn on the clothing of the Emperor and members of his family. Lung is a symbol of good luck and often shown as a composite creature with the antlers of a deer, head of a crocodile, hawk’s claws, and other animal features. The Chinese dragon was the ruler of weather and water, and was considered a symbol of prosperity and good luck.
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Senufo people of Côte d’Ivoire
Kponyungo “Firespitter” helmet mask, late 19th/early 20th century
Wood
S1.2021
This mask is worn by dancers at funerals of important male and female elders of the powerful Poro or Pondo societies found in several African countries. The dancers beat on drums placed on the torso of the deceased to ward off evil and help the soul reach the spirit world. Themask symbolizes the chaos before the world was ordered. Animal parts represented in the design include spiked crocodile teeth, the snout of a hyena or crocodile, warthog tusks coming out of the mouth, and ram or buffalo horns flanking the nose. The two small animals on top of the head are a chameleon and a hornbill.
Jyoti Bhatt
Born 1934, Bhavnagar, Gujarat, India
The Lost Pundit (N.Y. 1966), 1978
Etching
1985.14
Bhatt is an artist and scholar of Indian folk art. His prints explore the language of Indian cultural symbols. The owl features heavily in Hindu literature and is often associated with wealth and wisdom based on its innovative and successful hunting skills. The Goddesses Lakshmi and Dhamunda have owls as their Vahana, a spirit used for communication. The owl in Bhatt’s image appears to be some kind of physical and spiritual guide as well, an idea suggested by the presence of arrows next to it and the symbols of Eastern and Western religions on its figure.
Maurice Bebb
Born 1891, Chicago, Illinois
Died 1986, Muskogee, Oklahoma
Screech Owl, 1977
Aquatint and softground etching on satin
Gift of the Maurice Bebb family, 2018.356
Bebb was a florist, and an avid botanist, birder, print collector, and self-trained printmaker. After retiring in 1951, he decided to focus on printmaking, finding support from fellow members of the Prairie Print Makers. A birdwatcher since fifth grade, Bebb created detailed ornithological images of birds in their environment, producing nearly one hundred such images. A text for this print reads, “The Eastern Screech Owl (Magascops aiso) can be found in two different color morphs—red and gray.” The red morph pictured here is one of three images of screech owls created by the artist.
John David Boyd
Born 1939, London, Arkansas
Died 2012, Wichita, Kansas
Cat, 2012
Inkjet print
Gift of the Estate of John Boyd, 2013.192
Boyd depicted the simple pleasures of life in his art. This included whimsical versions of family pets, including the cat (Felis catus), inspired by Ozark folk art and 1960s California counter-culture comics from his childhood and teen years.
Jacques Hnizdovsky
Born 1915, Pylypche, Ternopol,Austria-Hungary (territory of Ukraine)
Died 1985, Bronxville, New York
Sleeping Cat, published 1970
Associated American Artists
Woodcut
Bequest of Raymond and Melba Budge, 1992.167
When Hnizdovskyimmigrated to the United States in 1949, he was penniless. Since he could not pay models, he drew his inspiration from nature and became a regular at the Bronx Zoo.Sleeping Cat is a good example of his borderless designsfeaturingdistinctive patterns from nature.
Caroline Thorington
Born 1943, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Shanti, 2004
Lithograph
Gift of Caroline Thorington, 2017.298
Shantimeans peace or calm and is a word used in Sanskrit, Hindi, and Marathi languages. Thorington’s Asian Elephant (Elephas maximus), identified by its small ears, is native to India. The print is part of the series Natural History inspired by her husband’s work as a curator in the mammal division of the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC. Shanti lived in the nearby National Zoo.
John Steuart Curry
Born 1897, Dunavant, Kansas
Died 1946, Madison, Wisconsin
Elephants at the Circus, 1932
Photomechanical reproduction
Bequest of Kathleen G. Curry, 2002.1071
Curry spent April of 1932 traveling with Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. His sketchbooks are full of drawings of elephants, clowns, and the trapeze artists, the Flying Cardonas. The massive elephants lined up for a meal of hay may have reminded Curry of the winter-eating habits of the cattle raised on his family’s farm in Kansas.Ringling Bros. retired its elephants in 2016 in response to the Humane Society’s campaign against cruelty to the animals.
Artist unknown
Guardian lions, 20th century
Ivory with wood base
Gift of Ruth Miller, 1995.4a, 1995.4b
Guardian lions date from the Han Dynasty (206 BCE–8 CE) in China, when imposing stone lions guarded imperial gates. They are always presented as a female/male pair, reflecting the duality found in nature. The male is shown with a paw on a ball (xiuqiu, or “flower of life”) and the female with a paw on a lion cub. The male is believed to protect the house or palace andthe female protects those dwelling inside. The animal sculptures are often called Lion Dogs, or Fu and Foo Dogs.
William Wind McKim
Born 1916, Independence, Missouri
Died 1995, Kansas City, Missouri
Puma, ca. 1978
Lithograph
Gift of John, Susan and Johnny Watt in memory of Sarah Katherine Watt, 2006.307
McKim is known for his highly naturalisticdepictions of birds and mammals. He was attracted by animalsat a young age, observing them as his family moved from Utah to Missouri. Pumas (Puma concolor) are large, secretive cats. They are commonly known as cougars or mountain lions and can be found in the western half of the United States. While not commonly seen today, they once roamed Kansas insignificant numbers.
Thomas Hart Benton
Born 1889, Neosho, Missouri
Died 1975, Kansas City, Kansas
White Calf, 1945
Associated American Artists
Lithograph
Bequest of Raymond and Melba Budge, 1992.61b
Benton was part of the 1930s Regionalist movement and is well known for his depictions of American life, including farm work. Benton wrote about this image: “Henry Look of Chilmark, Martha’s Vineyard milking his cow. Henry had a good deal selling his milk until some prying summer persons found him sharing it in his snot filled handkerchief. Trade with Henry dropped off after that.”
Janet Elizabeth Turner
Born 1914, Kansas City, Missouri
Died 1988, Chico, California
Bulldogging Stock, 1949
Linoleum cut
Gift of Jim and Virginia Moffett, 2000.180
Turner studied painting with Benton at the Kansas City Art Institute during World War II and later also became a professor of art. Her work draws from her time living in rural settings in Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Texas, and California. The artist created Bulldogging Stock while living in Texas. The image’s multi-colored bulls (Bos taurus) may be assembled for branding or a rodeo event such as bulldogging, in which cowboys rope and wrestle cattle to the ground.
KSU, Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art, gift of Joe and Barb Zanatta, 2018.372
Quick-to-See Smith and her son Ambrose-Smith collaborated on this print of a coyote encountering and conquering the big city. Animals are a common feature of Native American lore. Smith has written: “Coyote is part of our Salish creation story, s/he helped Amotken ‘turn on the lights’ at the beginning of the world. Coyote is also every human, foolish, bright, conniving, beneficent, helpful, greedy and generous. Coyote is a trickster and is always turning everything around, upside down.”
Peter (Fritz) Fritts Felten, Jr.
Born 1933, Hays, Kansas
Coyote, 1969
Woodcut
Gift of Nancy S. Vogel, PhD, in memory of John H. and Irene Schaake Vogel and Gerald M. Vogel, 2015.123
Felton is known for his stone sculptures of Bison—a giant one welcomes visitors to Hayes, Kansas. His version of the Coyote (Canis latrans) seems to capture some of the human character traits associated with the animal. Coyotes have been referred to as wily or crafty and Felton’s seems to be kin to the cartoon character Wile E. Coyote, perhaps hatching a plan against his nemesis, the Roadrunner.