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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 1, 1979)
THE BATTALION THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1979 Page 3 Art preserves ties of former vet, animals By CHERYL CESSNA Li-s, ground gypsum which will support I think everybody needs goals. Battalion ReDorter f the oil. I do some watercolor — Right now I m working toward ad- By CHERYL CESSNA Battalion Reporter . He put down his scalpel to pick iTjS ip a paintbrush, but he’s still work- ^ ng with animals. Bryan artist James Harvey ohnson, 34, graduated from Texas itnporta]i|V&M University in 1969, but J sponsor witched f rom practicing veterinary nt partjejnedicine to painting in 1972. Ipfd been in practice three years idently, n d I accepted a position at the ective p^Jnited States Department of Agric- s > andtlieUhire — a research position. About 1 to letjLHt time, which was in ’71 or ’72, I •at advanT arte ^ drawing again, ’ Johnson 3 valid ( a id. noting S As 1 matured as an artist and •> did passfjl^ 6 business grew, I came to a •cans pn ,0 * llt wh er e I really wanted to see and at |(h would do. I was ready for a ;ived oveB n ^ e; ^ didn’t particularly want to greeinj, dvance any further in research be- limited ■ lse ^ ^ have to continue my edu- ‘stitution,^ l0n ’”. he Said ' sl ow (i^’B “So it was either go back in st-g n ,i! iractice or become an artist. I didn’t ca ]]y ev jnt to go back in debt again with oot'affecit P rac d ce . so I chose this because is a likelil§l rea dy established and rganiz«d® ng we ^- ^ n d if I Lad never done cans. solve (lie 1 by the r future *i' not, the fustrated? any then I always would have won- ed whether I could or not. ’ rom the looks of things, Johnson sn’t have to wonder anymore. I’d say an average painting uld sell for $750 to $1,200. Of Purse I’ve done smaller and I’ve y i . . Ine larger. I sold more in the ear- ' *6’ years than I do now because I fts doing smaller things. But this 'e ir, of the major paintings. I’ve rad maybe 15, and another 15 or 20 ■the smaller ones,” he said. ■His wife and business manager, Icicille, said Johnson is working on a ■owing to be held Nov. 17 at the ■aner Gallery in Huntsville. She ■d the gallery is introducing a lim- ted edition of 490 signed prints, ■lich will sell for $100 each. I “We’ve been planning it for P^ut a year,” she said, “so it’s going I e a major show. He’s probably | tg to have about 20 original I es for sale there. “A lot of Jim’s work over the few years has been commis- | ed paintings. The people at the | 'ay invited him to do the show I jtt a year ago, so he’s been work- in things that were not commis- id to use in the show. It’s hard I it ready for a major showing like when you’re doing commis- ^ i. You really have to plan ahead I u’re a commission-painting ar- x | w hnson’s living room is a private iry of sorts; it’s filled with his tings, and also the occasional Iments of several parrots — n’t be mean,” “I pretty bird “What ya doin’?” ihnson said caged birds are his nary interest as a veterinarian, i do some consulting work, and I p my hand in on the clinical as- ts of caged birds. I have several hem as pets. I got interested in it :ause I had one bird who died mt a year ago. I replaced it, and i people I got it from started ask- J me questions about caged birds it I couldn’t answer,” he said. “So I did a lot of reading and ked to a lot of other veterinarians d developed somewhat of an ex- rtise. And I still do some relief jk — if a vet goes on vacation. I’ll e on his clients while he’s gone. ’ Johnson not only has birds as pets .t he also hunts them, and is qudi chairman of the local chapter of ct. If eve'Ducks Unlimited, ctive m® It’s a non—profit conservation (get soinf or g an i za tion, and there’s no gov ernment money in it. Money has nine monbeen donated to it by duck hunters come updo purchase and lease wetlands in ilittlesteffbe United States, Canada and Mexico for the nesting grounds of s Brothel^terfowl. Non-game species bene fit from it, too.” He said he sees no conflict be tween his profession and hunting. “The types of animals I hunt are only available because of hunters, ” James Harvey Johnson, a 1969 Texas A&M University graduate, displays one of his new painting which will be shown Nov. 17 in Huntsville. said Johnson, “I’m a conservationist in that I know that the funds that are generated from hunting have al lowed the types of animals that I hunt to still exist. This is because of the amount of money needed for propagation and for Ducks Unlim ited to buy wetlands. “As a result there is a huntable population of ducks; otherwise, there wouldn’t be any at all. I feel real good about it. It’s conservation rather than preservation. Conserva tion’s just the use of a renewable re source, and I feel very strongly about that,” Johnson said. “I probably would not have had the inspiration to be an artist if it had not been for my experiences as a youngster hunting and getting to know bird dogs,” he said. Johnson calls on his early experi ences as a hunter in West Texas as an inspiration for his paintings. “I’ve painted a lot of different thinqs, but now I concentrate on the subjects I feel I know the best. Most of those are dogs, mostly sporting dogs — pointers, setters, retrievers — and selected wildlife. ” Battalion photo by Lynn Blanco “I don’t really call myself a wild life artist, although I do a lot of that type of thing. But those are my favorite subjects, the ones that I really prefer to do. I think any good artist, if he really researches what he’s doing and gets a grasp on it, can do almost anything. But all of them have favorites, because that’s the thing they know the best. And it will show in their work, too,” he said. Johnson said he occasionally paints from photographs, even though there is a controversy among painters about their use. “Generally, when I do that. I’ll take my own because I can’t depend on anyone else’s photographs. The artist is still behind the camera; he’s still thinking as an artist, rather than as a photographer. The kind of in formation I need from that photo graph is different from what the photographer is trying to portray in a photogragh standing on its own.” Johnson says he uses chiefly oil. “I paint on Masonite, which is a trade name for a sort of pressed wood. 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Johnson said the commission he would most like to receive would be to paint Secretariat. “I painted his daughter, Terlingua, and I’d like to paint him. I was commissioned by a man in Midland whose son co owned the daughter of Secretariat. “She had the most potential of any of Secretariat’s progeny, and she won several hundred thousand dollars. She was a 2-year-old at the time I was commissioned, in Oc tober 1978, and there was a chance that if she did well, she could run in the Kentucky Derby as a 3-year-old. But she missed it by one race. It would have been nice because it would have been the first time in 20 years a filly has run against colts in the Kentucky Derby.” Johnson said horses are hard as signments. “Horses are very beautiful, but they re veiy difficult to paint be cause of the color and conformation, especially in a case like that of Ter lingua. If I were just paintinq a horse I could make it like I wanted it. But when it’s somebody’s horse, and especially a horse like that, it has to be exact,” he said. Johnson said he is still trying to perfect his craft. T think everybody needs goals. Right now I’m working toward ad mission to the Society of Animal Ar tists. It’s strictly by invitation, al though you submit work to a jury of the members. It doesn’t make me a better artist, but I think the people who have bought my work deserve that because it will enhance the value of my work. “The main thing beyond that is that every painting be better than the last one. Painting, or that type of creative work, takes a lot of matur ity. I ve found that you get better as you get older, because you see things differently. Art is a difficult area, and you just don’t get good overnight — it takes years.” DINE IN OR TAKE HOME! TACOS.. . AND MUCH MORE! DELICIOUS. SPICY FAST FRIENDLY SERVICE. 3312 S. 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