A copy of
this picture hung on my wall when I was Public Affairs Director at Hoffmann-La Roche, which perhaps says
more about the shot-‘em-dead working environment
of a global pharmaceutical company than any war stories I could share.
Painted in
1903 on canvas (3' 4.13" x 27.13") and currently housed at the Museum
of Fine Arts in Houston, Texas, Fight
for the Water Hole is a remarkable picture.
As we said previously, Frederic Remington (1861-1909) thought
of the West mostly as a place of peril, privation and as a land where heroes
met (or where ploughed under by) these challenges.
To demonstrate
how Remington illustrated peril, look closely at what is happening here. The water hole is really slightly more than a
miserable puddle of water – a puddle in the middle of a vast expanse of arid
desert. Five men and their horses are
huddled inside, and the men hold their rifles at the ready, for protecting the
water hole is their sole hope for survival.
Indians circle in the distance. And
Remington doesn’t seem to hold out much hope for cowboys: in the upper right of
the picture is what seems to be one of his trademark cattle skulls, bleached
white by the sun.
Remington
divides the painting into broad swatches of color, putting the viewer slightly
above the action. This not only gives us
a bird’s eye view of the steely-eyed westerner (who looks a bit like actor Sam Elliott), but also provides a view
of the purplish mountains in the far distance.
This expanse increases the importance of the waterhole: though it is
large in the painting, it is infinitesimal in the scheme of the landscape.
The long
shadow on the right side of the hole does not bode well for our heroes – day is
clearly waning, making them more vulnerable.
This is especially poignant given the historical moment at which it was
painted: in 1903, people were distraught by the closing off of the West. Here, not only the West but Western heroes
are facing an irrecoverable end of their own.
And, in view of the recent Indian Wars, here are heroes of which we will
never see the like again.
Fight for
the Waterhole was published in 1903 in Collier’s
Weekly as part of Remington's four-year contract with the magazine to
reproduce one painting each month. This alliance encouraged Remington to
experiment with his technique, and as seen here, the results included looser
brushwork, refined compositions, a bolder palette, and the development of
psychological qualities in his art. The
action is inspired by landscapes such as the Sierra Bonita Ranch in Arizona, and
on the Buffalo Wallow Fight in the Texas Panhandle during the Indian Wars. However, I believe Remington painted this
picture while comfortably ensconced in New York.
More Remington tomorrow!
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