Wax, Wildflowers and a Wildcatter

Lyn Belisle

“Here's the thing about wildflowers they take root wherever they are grow strong through the wind, rain, pain, sunshine, blue skies and starless nights they dance, even when it seems there is nothing worth dancing for they bloom with or without you.”

Alisha Christensen, Still Growing Wildflowers

By Permission of the Author

The IEA Annual Juried Exhibition that opens on June 11 at the San Antonio Art League & Museum is a fascinating fusion of past and present. The theme, Wax and Wildflowers, is a nod to the Davis Wildflower Competition presented by the very same organization in 1927. According to art historian William Reaves, the Davis Wildflower Competition at the San Antonio Art League literally blossomed into the state’s first true art extravaganza, presenting sensational art “happenings” that served to synergize nascent and far-flung arts communities across the state and catapult Texas art into the national spotlight.

Edgar B. Davis, visionary and eccentric, was a rancher, wildcatter, and philanthropist, who organized the international call to artists for the exhibit. He loved wildflowers and believed that bluebonnets brought him luck when he drilled his first oil well in a bluebonnet field.

Interestingly, the First Prize winner of the 1927 wildflower competition was a British-born impressionist painter, Dawson Dawson-Watson, whose prize-winning work celebrated the lowly prickly pear cactus. Women were also among the prize winners. This wonderful painting, Wild Poppies, was done by Isabel Bronson Cartwright from Pennsylvania.

The IEA Jurors, William and Linda Reaves, compliment this IEA/ San Antonio Art League wildflower collaboration. Gallerist, historian, and author William Reaves literally wrote the book on this important 1927 event titled Texas Art and a Wildcatter's Dream: Edgar B. Davis and the San Antonio Art League.

The Davis Competition paintings were done in 1927 by artists who were tasked with representing the beauty of wildflowers in classic compositions on canvas. Almost a century later, artists who submitted to IEA’s Wax and Wildflowers at the San Antonio Art League & Museum in 2023 have been invited to widen the lens by representing the wildflower concept in unrestricted, untraditional ways with wax as the only common bond and to celebrate the enduring wildflowers in a new creative conversation.

Celtic ConVergence — Wax Across the Water is co-hosted by International Encaustic Artists (IEA), Mulranny Arts in Mulranny, Ireland, and IEA's European Encaustic Chapter.