Julian Onderdonk. American Impressionist Dallas Museum of Art Publications

This lavishly illustrated catalogue offers a critical look at Impressionist Julian Onderdonk (1882–1922), one of Texas's finest landscape painters and a pupil of William Merritt Chase. Onderdonk transformed the Texas landscape, creating indelible images of his native state. One of Chase’s most dazzling students at the Shinnecock Summer School in Long Island, he brought Chase’s aesthetic of nature to an entirely new part of the American landscape. By his death at age 40, Onderdonk had been christened “The Bluebonnet Painter” in recognition of his lush signature landscapes featuring fields of the state flower.  

 

The essays examine the relationship between Chase and Onderdonk and how that dialogue transformed the way the latter viewed Texas. They also address Onderdonk’s relationship to the Western American tradition of landscape painting. Readers and viewers interested in American landscape, American Impressionism, and Southwestern art will enjoy both the critical essays and the beautiful illustrations—many never before seen.