GARY NIBLETT

The reason Gary Niblett's paintings ring true is that they are true. They arise from his background, his personal experience, his very bones. From earliest childhood, he inhabited the American West in his imagination and in reality, soaking up the daily activities of life on the range while he was memorizing its history through books and family stories.

Niblett was raised in Carlsbad, New Mexico, and often visited his relatives' farms and ranches in West Texas. Later, as a young man, he helped out on roundups and brandings and learned about the cowboy way of life. All the while, he was developing his skills as an artist. Even before he graduated from high school, ranchers commissioned him to paint portraits of their prize horses. He enrolled in Eastern New Mexico University in Portales, where his professors encouraged him to try to get into the famed Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles. He had never heard of it, but he dutifully applied and was accepted.

At the Art Center, he honed the skills he had already acquired by diligent practice at home. Before he could graduate, he was offered a job at Hanna-Barbera Studios as a background painter, and it was there that he polished and integrated his skills with the brush. Most of all, he mastered the balance of light and dark. "Values are the key," he says. "You could almost have no details at all, and if the values were right, the painting would still be successful."

Niblett kept up with what was going on with the art scene at large. When the Cowboy Artists of America had their first show in 1965, he says, "I lit up. It couldn't have been more perfect timing." He had continued his easel painting, and now he began exhibiting at local galleries. He sent his work to Margaret Jamison in Santa Fe, and to Troy's Cowboy Art Gallery in Scottsdale, Arizona. They loved his work, and he was on his way.

In the meantime, he had met and married a fellow artist from the Hanna-Barbera, and by 1973 they had moved to Sedona, Arizona. Three years later Niblett became a member of the Cowboy Artists of America. The couple moved to Angel Fire, New Mexico, and then to Santa Fe, where they live today.

Niblett spends most of his time in the studio, painting, except for brief research trips. He has been on several wagon trains, riding horseback down the Old Santa Fe Trail, the Mormon Trail, and other frontier thoroughfares. Back in the studio with fresh ideas in mind, he combines details from different slides and sketches to create his renowned paintings.

The honesty inherent in a Niblett canvas comes from the time-honored tradition of remaining true to his roots, respecting his heritage and building on it through education and hard work, then giving something back to his country and his forebears. His life and his work are all of a piece. He says, "I always knew I wanted to do what I'm doing now."