Ernest Martin Hennings (1886-1956), Cattle on the Move (Yellow House Division XIT Ranch), c. 1910
Ernest Martin Hennings
(1886-1956)
Cattle on the Move (Yellow House Division XIT Ranch), c. 1910
oil on canvas
verso: label, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
35 x 144 inches
Lot includes a copy of the book by David B. Gracy II, "A Man Absolutely Sure of Himself: Texan George Washington Littlefield".
Provenance: George Washingon Littlefield (commissioned from the artist, c. 1910)
American National Bank, Austin Texas, 1911-1950s
M Bank, Bank One, JP Morgan Chase (ownership transferred from above during bank acquisitions)
Private collection, Dallas, Texas (purchased from the above, 1997)
Exhibited: "The Texas Landscape 1900-1986." The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, May 17- September 7, 1986
Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum, Canyon, Texas, September 9, 2011- January 20, 2012
National Ranching and Heritage Center, Lubbock, Texas, September-October 2012
Literature: Gracy II, David B. "A Man Absolutely Sure of Himself: Texan George Washington Littlefield", the University of Oklahoma Press, 2019. Illustrated figs. 29, 31; p. 257-258.
Rogan, Octavia F. Interview with George Washington Littlefield, San Antonio Express, June 4, 1916.
A group of cowboys form a rope corral around the remuda of horses while one ropes out a mount from his string in "The Round-Up". Cowboys in the background herd white-faced Hereford cows and their calves in the foreground, likely depicting a move from one pasture to another, in "Cattle on the Move". Thoroughbred horses graze on short-grass prairie with tall cottonwoods along a river in the background in "Thorough-Breds". Just to the right of center in the middle ground of "Thorough-Breds", and the only equine not grazing, stands a mule.
Besides being one of the most lavish, modern and prestigious buildings in the nation upon its completion in 1911, the Littlefield bank building in Austin, Texas, held six large-scale paintings by future famed Taos Colony artist E. Martin Hennings.
George Washington Littlefield became a successful cattleman and rancher after fighting with one of the more notable units in the Civil War, Terry’s Texas Rangers. He was one of the earliest ranchers in the region; his 1877 LIT Ranch (and its brand) still exist near Channing, Texas. With his surplus of wealth, Littlefield began his career in banking, doubling his capital in a short amount of time, and built the nine-story building in downtown Austin.
Before Chicago artist Hennings first visited Taos in 1917, Littlefield commissioned Hennings to produce art that would hang in his new office at the new American National Bank building in Austin. Wanting to be surrounded by his ranch, cattle, and horses, the works portray life on the Yellow House Ranch on the Texas South Plains (formerly part of the XIT Ranch) and the LFD Farm in the Pecos Valley in New Mexico. Littlefield supplied Hennings with photographs taken on both ranches on which the painter based the ranching scenes. Hennings’s resulting six paintings (he actually created nine) depicted “the most handsome and heaviest [white face] bull, a cowboy selecting his mount form a … rope corral, … a large herd of [white face] cattle … on a drive… a group of sleek horses [and mules] grazing, cattle lazing in a field, and apple trees weighted down by their fruit.”
Littlefield also commissioned a sculptor to produce ranching images for the cast bronze doors for his bank. Feeling the sculptor may have lacked familiarity with cattle and ranching, Littlefield sent the “Easterner” to the Yellow House and LFD ranches “to see and feel the land, the cattle, and the cowmen going about their work.” One wonders if Littlefield sent Hennings to his ranches too.
Born in Penns Grove, New Jersey, Hennings moved with his family to Chicago in 1888. From 1901 to 1906 he studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). Hennings began his career as a commercial artist, muralist, and portrait painter. His first mural commission for the SAIC cafeteria coincided with the school's introduction of a new mural painting program. Additional known Hennings murals include those for the Florentine Ballroom at the Congress Hotel, Chicago, and for the Grace Episcopal Cathedral, Topeka, Kansas. At the time of the Littlefield commission Hennings was a little-known painter.
Tiring of commercial art, Hennings then studied at the Munich Royal Academy until 1914 when World War I forced his return home. After resuming his commercial art career in Chicago, a group of Chicago businessmen sponsored him to paint at Taos, New Mexico, in 1917. He moved to Taos in 1921 and was elected to the Taos Society of Artists in 1924. Hennings stayed in Taos for the remainder of his life.
Hennings returned to mural painting during the New Deal completing a mural for the Van Buren, Arkansas, post office. The Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, a patron since 1925, commissioned him to paint a series of five paintings for calendars which he finished months before his death.
Michael R. Grauer
Historian of the American West
Estimate
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Ernest Martin Hennings
(1886-1956)
Cattle on the Move (Yellow House Division XIT Ranch), c. 1910
oil on canvas
verso: label, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
35 x 144 inches
Lot includes a copy of the book by David B. Gracy II, "A Man Absolutely Sure of Himself: Texan George Washington Littlefield".
Provenance: George Washingon Littlefield (commissioned from the artist, c. 1910)
American National Bank, Austin Texas, 1911-1950s
M Bank, Bank One, JP Morgan Chase (ownership transferred from above during bank acquisitions)
Private collection, Dallas, Texas (purchased from the above, 1997)
Exhibited: "The Texas Landscape 1900-1986." The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, May 17- September 7, 1986
Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum, Canyon, Texas, September 9, 2011- January 20, 2012
National Ranching and Heritage Center, Lubbock, Texas, September-October 2012
Literature: Gracy II, David B. "A Man Absolutely Sure of Himself: Texan George Washington Littlefield", the University of Oklahoma Press, 2019. Illustrated figs. 29, 31; p. 257-258.
Rogan, Octavia F. Interview with George Washington Littlefield, San Antonio Express, June 4, 1916.
A group of cowboys form a rope corral around the remuda of horses while one ropes out a mount from his string in "The Round-Up". Cowboys in the background herd white-faced Hereford cows and their calves in the foreground, likely depicting a move from one pasture to another, in "Cattle on the Move". Thoroughbred horses graze on short-grass prairie with tall cottonwoods along a river in the background in "Thorough-Breds". Just to the right of center in the middle ground of "Thorough-Breds", and the only equine not grazing, stands a mule.
Besides being one of the most lavish, modern and prestigious buildings in the nation upon its completion in 1911, the Littlefield bank building in Austin, Texas, held six large-scale paintings by future famed Taos Colony artist E. Martin Hennings.
George Washington Littlefield became a successful cattleman and rancher after fighting with one of the more notable units in the Civil War, Terry’s Texas Rangers. He was one of the earliest ranchers in the region; his 1877 LIT Ranch (and its brand) still exist near Channing, Texas. With his surplus of wealth, Littlefield began his career in banking, doubling his capital in a short amount of time, and built the nine-story building in downtown Austin.
Before Chicago artist Hennings first visited Taos in 1917, Littlefield commissioned Hennings to produce art that would hang in his new office at the new American National Bank building in Austin. Wanting to be surrounded by his ranch, cattle, and horses, the works portray life on the Yellow House Ranch on the Texas South Plains (formerly part of the XIT Ranch) and the LFD Farm in the Pecos Valley in New Mexico. Littlefield supplied Hennings with photographs taken on both ranches on which the painter based the ranching scenes. Hennings’s resulting six paintings (he actually created nine) depicted “the most handsome and heaviest [white face] bull, a cowboy selecting his mount form a … rope corral, … a large herd of [white face] cattle … on a drive… a group of sleek horses [and mules] grazing, cattle lazing in a field, and apple trees weighted down by their fruit.”
Littlefield also commissioned a sculptor to produce ranching images for the cast bronze doors for his bank. Feeling the sculptor may have lacked familiarity with cattle and ranching, Littlefield sent the “Easterner” to the Yellow House and LFD ranches “to see and feel the land, the cattle, and the cowmen going about their work.” One wonders if Littlefield sent Hennings to his ranches too.
Born in Penns Grove, New Jersey, Hennings moved with his family to Chicago in 1888. From 1901 to 1906 he studied at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). Hennings began his career as a commercial artist, muralist, and portrait painter. His first mural commission for the SAIC cafeteria coincided with the school's introduction of a new mural painting program. Additional known Hennings murals include those for the Florentine Ballroom at the Congress Hotel, Chicago, and for the Grace Episcopal Cathedral, Topeka, Kansas. At the time of the Littlefield commission Hennings was a little-known painter.
Tiring of commercial art, Hennings then studied at the Munich Royal Academy until 1914 when World War I forced his return home. After resuming his commercial art career in Chicago, a group of Chicago businessmen sponsored him to paint at Taos, New Mexico, in 1917. He moved to Taos in 1921 and was elected to the Taos Society of Artists in 1924. Hennings stayed in Taos for the remainder of his life.
Hennings returned to mural painting during the New Deal completing a mural for the Van Buren, Arkansas, post office. The Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, a patron since 1925, commissioned him to paint a series of five paintings for calendars which he finished months before his death.
Michael R. Grauer
Historian of the American West
Estimate
Reserve
Time, Location
Auction House
