Art of the American West. Bert Geer Phillips. A-Z Challenge.

Song of the Aspen. c.1926-28.  Bert Geer Phillips. (1868-1956)

Dover Publications Inc. Mineola, New York. Great Paintings of  the American West.

Bert Geer Phillips was an American Artist and founding member of the Taos Society of Artists and was the first to permanently settle in Taos, New Mexico.  Primarily known for his paintings of Native Americans, New Mexico, and the American Southwest.

He was born in Hudson, New York in 1868.  Stories of Kit Carson, and adventures of Western adventure fascinated him while growing up. In later years he said, as a child, you could always find him, paintbrush in hand. When he was sixteen, he moved to New York and attended the Art Students League and the National Academy of Design. Paris was next where he studied at the Academie Julian.

He returned to New York and in 1898, he and Ernest Blumenschein, another noted artist, set out to explore the American West.  After buying equipment in Denver, Colorado, their wagon broke down in Northern New Mexico.  Repairing their wagon in Taos, they decided to stay and open a studio.  Blumenschein left a few months later, but Phillips stayed and created the Taos Society of Artists. (more on Taos on the "T" day of the Challenge.)

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bert_Geer_Phillips