John Nieto: Four Decades

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John Nieto Four Decades June 11 through August 22, 2021

Railyard Arts District | 1613 Paseo de Peralta | Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 | tel 505.988.3250 www.lewallengalleries.com | contact@lewallengalleries.com cover: Plains Warrior with Green Moccasins, 1999, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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John Nieto: Four Decades

Without memory, there is no culture.

Without memory, there would be no civilization, no society, no future.

- Elie Wiesel

With quiet and steadfast resolve, American artist John Nieto gave to the world a chronicle of Native American people and important aspects of their histories and cultures in painted image. He dedicated a major part of his professional life to studying and then relating onto canvas portraits of people that he knew must be remembered. His images include those of key figures in the struggle Indigenous people endured to survive efforts to conquer them and their traditions, rituals and arts. Chiefs, warriors, and those who worked in villages to preserve the life and ways that have defined the various cultures of Native Americans, all are remembered in beautiful colorful canvases for which Nieto is known worldwide.

Collectively, Nieto’s nearly 60 years of creating these paintings provide a visual encyclopedia of people and an indelible history that remains a vital part of our contemporary world today.

Even more generally, Nieto, who passed away in 2018, is broadly celebrated for his emotionally resonant paintings of Indigenous figures and other subjects of Western America. All of his paintings are rendered in heightened, expressive color, which registers his imagery in memory and imagination. Inspired by his Native American and New Mexican roots, Nieto painted a wide range of figures from Southwestern culture and lore—both contemporary and historical—with an intensely fauvist palette and powerful brushwork. Known as a brilliant colorist, Nieto conveyed his images of Indigenous people—as well as wildlife and historical icons of the Southwest using vivid, powerful hues that express the artist’s intention that these figures be worthy of honor, memory and emotional connection by all.

John Nieto: Four Decades is an exhibition at LewAllen Galleries comprised of works from 40 years of painting. Featured are impressive works from the 2010s and 2000s, as well as classic, rarely seen paintings from the 1980s and the 1990s that many consider to have been created at the peak of his career.

The exhibition begins on Friday, June 11 and remains on view through Saturday, August 22, 2021.

Over the course of six decades, Nieto’s distinctively expressive works became known for their use of bold, expressive, and intuitive color combinations. The vibrancy and eloquence of these colors, and the adept combinations he made of them, provide a visual language that captivates and enraptures his viewers. “We are born with a genetic memory or consciousness of color, and everyone’s choice of color is personal,” he observed.

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Nieto was heavily influenced early in his career by the vibrant expressive paintings of the French Fauvists and German Expressionists. One of the artists Nieto counted as among his major influences was the esteemed 19th century French Neoclassical painter Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres.

A great colorist in his own right, Ingres declared that “color is the animal part of art.” For Nieto, painting a century later, a more apt truth would be hard to find. Nieto was deeply influenced by the beliefs and culture of Native American heritage, including the importance of animals as part of the creation story and as sacred carriers of spiritual meanings. For him, color expressed his deepest impulses, passions and feelings. It was indeed the “animal part” of his art and foundational to his artistic vision. In his words, “My colors express my worldview.” Indeed, Nieto might properly be called an American Fauve.

Nieto believed that it was through powerful colorations that he might engage his audience most profoundly and express his deepest felt sense of awe and love for Indigenous and other people of his heritage. His paintings serve to both sustain memory and stir imagination. The images are redolent with the feelings of respect, admiration, curiosity, empathy and celebration that Nieto sought to inspire about Native people and the culture of this place.

Much of Nieto’s work seeks to commemorate and embody an enshrining consciousness about figures from Native American and also Southwestern Spanish culture. Nieto was deeply engaged in scholarly and historical research as part of his process. He frequently was inspired by museum photos from the 1880s to 1910 in creating imposing portraits of chiefs and braves, potters and weavers. In his paintings, there is preserved for eternity a kind of cultural patrimony that his figures uniquely represent.

Nieto’s images become indelible avatars of Southwestern history, lest their place in our cultural memory be erased by its greatest enemies, time and disinterest. Here are the hunters, the elders, the archers, the drummers, the shamans, the warriors, the ola bearers, the plateros—the figures of legend and ancestral tradition whose stories and experiences might otherwise be forgotten. And then there are the animals: the wolves and coyotes, the buffalo and eagles, the bear and the deer, each bearing their own set of symbols, meaning, and stories rooted in different Indigenous traditions.

It was from the enduring and vibrant beauty of all these images, reflected by Nieto in the electric colors and engaging timeless forms of his painted figures that the memory and the spirit of Indigenous cultures might continue to live. Through his art and his effort to sustain the memory of people and times, John Nieto has become a national treasure of American contemporary art.

- Kenneth R. Marvel

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In the history of art only a select number of artists distinguish themselves as originators of a personal idiom that reverberates beyond place and time. John Nieto is one of those originals. His eye-dazzling paintings rank him among the vanguard of contemporary American colorists.

Recognized worldwide for his signature blend of expressive colors, dynamic brushwork, and powerful compositions, Nieto is an American artist who speaks in a universal language. His personal story … is a journey of discovery. His paintings combine reverence for his heritage with a sophisticated worldview.

They are also autobiographical.

Nieto depicts Native peoples as icons of dignity and unity. His buffalo, bears, and coyotes are symbols of survival. Each is captured in pulsating saturated hues that affirm the vibrant spirituality inherent in all living things.

- Susan Hallsten McGarry, John Nieto: Forces of Color and Spirit (2009 artist monograph)

While in Paris in 1969, Nieto saw and admired the work of the painters for whom painting was a swift, emotional process designed to release on canvas the core of the subconscious. Nieto absorbed the lesson, but uses what he has absorbed in his own way, to his own purposes. Whereas the European Expressionists sought to unlock the keyhole of the unconscious, Nieto uses the technique as the means of gaining access to realms of the spirit—for him, the act of painting is a ritual, and all rituals are meant to transcend their rites, to elevate the participant into a wider, deeper, and higher state of consciousness.

The European Expressionists were interested in burrowing; Nieto is interested in soaring.”

- Jay Scott, John Nieto (catalog for 1989 exhibition at Axis Gallery, Tokyo)

Nieto’s trademark subjects are doused in vibrant, asymmetrical planes of color that express his continued love for Fauvism and strong, graphic imagery. His Native American figures wear brightly woven garments, and many clutch hunting tools, buffalo shields, feathers, and other objects that represent their heritage.

- Kim Agricola, Southwest Art, July 2018 The paintings of John Nieto thread the complex heritage of the Southwest through his own native ancestry, splashed in the primary colors of Matisse.

- Kathaleen Roberts, The Albuquerque Journal, August 2020 5

In Nieto’s extravagantly rainbowed work, shadows are impressionistic in the European manner (said Auguste Renoir, “Shadows are not black; no shadow is black. It always has color. Nature knows only colors.”), but his use of halation (the optical phenomenon that outlines the edges of things in color) is Eastern, an outgrowth of Japanese woodblock strategies and the techniques of cloisonné.

- Jay Scott, John Nieto (catalog for 1989 exhibition at Axis Gallery, Tokyo)

In contemplating the art of John Nieto, one is faced with a question that has haunted art critics for centuries: Who is the originator and who are the copyists? In this case the answer is simple. Amid a sea of copyists, John Nieto is an American original.

- Seth Hopkins, Foreword to John Nieto: Forces of Color and Spirit (2009 artist monograph)

Mary from Acoma Pueblo, 1988, acrylic on canvas, 48 x 60 inches

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Navajo Sand Painter, 1991, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Georgia O'Keeffe, 1989, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Nemo, 1989, acrylic on canvas, 44 x 40 inches

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Fancy Dancer (White Face Paint), acrylic on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

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Hopi Maiden, 1994 acrylic on canvas, 72 x 60 inches

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Cut Foot, 1991, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Southwestern Scion, 2005, acrylic on canvas, 48 x 60 inches

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Offering for the Return of the Buffalo, 1995, acrylic on canvas, 48 x 60 inches

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Plains Prayer, 1991, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Deer in Snow, 2013, acrylic on canvas, 24 x 30 inches

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Corn Grinder, 2012, acrylic on canvas, 48 x 48 inches

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Kiowa Delegate, 1990, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Zuni Olla Bearer, 1988, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Maria Benitez, 1992, acrylic on canvas, 44 x 40 inches

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Jack Red Cloud, 1993, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Pawnee Scout, 1994, acrylic on canvas, 44 x 40 inches

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Buffalo Dancer I, 2016, acrylic on canvas, 40 x 30 inches

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Man's Best Friend, 1990, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Apache Scout, 1995, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Hairy Bear (Ponca), 1986, acrylic on canvas, 48 x 60 inches

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Brave Bear (Cheyenne), 2011, acrylic on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

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Pueblo Potter, 1999, acrylic on canvas, 48 x 60 inches

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Kicking Bear, 1977, acrylic on canvas, 30 x 24 inches

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Shrouded Sioux, 1989, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Santa Clara Tablita Dancer, 1986, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

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Spotted Horse, 1989, acrylic on canvas, 44 x 40 inches

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John Nieto

(1937 - 2018 )

EDUCATION 1959 Bachelor of Fine Arts, Southern Methodist University SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2021 Four Decades, LewAllen Galleries, Santa Fe, NM 2020 The Legacy Paintings, LewAllen Galleries, Santa Fe, NM 2019 Ventana Fine Art, Santa Fe, NM (also 1987-2018) 2014 Altamira Fine Art, Scottsdale, AZ

Altamira Fine Art, Jackson Hole, WY (also 2009-2013) 2012 Nieto Fine Art, San Francisco, CA 2009 Contemporary Visions of the West: The Art of John Nieto,

Booth Western Art Museum, Cartersville, GA 2008 Mountain Trails Gallery, Jackson Hole, WY (also 2006 and

2007) 2002 Adagio, Palm Springs, CA (also 1995-2001) 1996 J. Cacciola Gallery, New York, NY (also 1983-1995)

William Y. Clements Center for Southwest Studies at SMU,

Dallas, TX 1993 University of Utah, Salt Lake City Museum 1986 Enthios Gallery, Santa Fe, NM (also 1980-1985) 1985 John Nieto: Retrospective, Wheelwright Museum of Indian

Art, Santa Fe, NM 1983 Governor’s Gallery, State Capitol Building, Santa Fe, NM 1982 Savage Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ (also 1980 and 1981) 1989 Axis Gallery, Tokyo, Japan 1981 10 Contemporary Artists, Taos, NM GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2012 Art in Embassies Program, Port Luis, Mauritius

Buffalo Bill Museum, Whitney Gallery of Western Art, Cody,

WY 2011 Nieto Fine Art, San Francisco, CA 2010 Nieto Fine Art, San Francisco, CA 2009 6th Annual Southeastern Cowboy Gathering (John Nieto

featured artist), Booth Western Art Museum,

Cartersville, GA 2008 25th Anniversary All Artists Show, Ventana Fine Art, Santa

Fe, NM

The Southwestern Art Collection of Charles & Jeanette

Gilchrist White, Lakeview Museum of Arts & Sciences,

Peoria, IL 2007 Museum of Contemporary Art, Hot Springs, AR

Booth Western Art Museum, Cartersville, GA

Small Works Show, Ventana Fine Art, Santa Fe, NM 2005 Jackson Hole Museum, Jackson Hole, WY

Ventana Fine Art, Santa Fe, NM

Small Works Show, Ventana Fine Art, Santa Fe, NM 2002 The Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas at

Austin, Austin, TX

“Peace and Loyalty,” commissioned by the Salt Lake

Organizing Committee, “Olympic Power Suite,”

Commemorative Artwork Commissioned in Honor of the

Games, Salt Lake City, UT

2001 Capital Art Foundation, Santa Fe, NM

New Mexico Museum of Fine Arts, Santa Fe, NM 1992 Pageant of the Masters, Laguna Beach, CA

Native American Invitational Exhibition, “Walk In Beauty” Santa

Fe, NM 1990 Art of Albuquerque, Group Exhibition, Museum of Albuquerque,

Albuquerque, NM 1985 The Art of the Native American, Owensboro Museum of Fine Art,

Owensboro, KY

Pageant of the Masters, Laguna Beach, CA 1984 Nabisco Show, Nabisco Corporate Headquarters, NJ

Marine Corps Museum, Washington, DC 1983 Contemporary Native American, The Heard Museum, Phoenix, AZ 1982 Window Exhibit, Lord and Taylor, New York, NY

Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO

American Indian Contemporary Art, Smithsonian Institution,

Washington, DC

Night of the First Americans, John F. Kennedy Center for the

Performing Arts, Washington, DC

United States Embassy and the United States International

Communications Agency, Barbados

Cabo Frio International Print Biennial, Cabo, Brazil 1981 Salon d’Automne, Grand Palais, Paris, France

Le Salon Des Nations a Paris, Centre International D’Art

Contemporain, Paris, France

20th Century American Indian Artists, Kimball Art Center, Park

City, UT

Native American Works, Pensacola Museum of Art, Pensacola, FL 1980 Gallup Inter-tribal Ceremonials, Gallup, NM 1979 Philbrook Museum, Tulsa, OK 1961 Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, Dallas, TX SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONS Arts and Science Museum, Statesville, NC Booth Western Art Museum, Cartersville, GA Buffalo Bill Museum, Cody, WY Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO, Institute of American Indian Art, Santa Fe, NM Jackson Hole Museum, Jackson Hole, WY Marine Corps Museum, Washington, DC Montclair Art Museum, Montclair, NJ Museum and Art Center, Sylacauga, AL Museum of Contemporary Art, Hot Springs, AR National Museum of Wildlife Art, Jackson Hole, WY New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe, NM Palm Springs Art Museum, Palm Springs, CA Senimore Art Museum, Cooperstown, NY The Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX The Heard Museum, Phoenix, AZ

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Railyard Arts District | 1613 Paseo de Peralta | Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 | tel 505.988.3250 www.lewallengalleries.com | contact@lewallengalleries.com © 2021 LewAllen Contemporary, LLC Artwork © Estate of John Nieto

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