The stark, wild landscape of the desert draws a particular kind of person: one who prefers the quiet drama of vast powers over the constant chatter of an urban life. The American West, for all its absence of audible noise, stirs the inner self with its expansive mystery. With so much of the history of Native peoples and the lands largely unwritten, the missing legends of the Guadalupe Mountains or the animals that traverse the Rio Grande leave one pondering the subtle shifts of wind or trying to read a stone. Evoking this subtle, vast mystery of the West, The New American West – By Brush and by Bronze, an exhibition at the Museum of the Big Bend in Alpine, features the artwork of Kathleen Frank and Mark Yale Harris.
Frank’s paintings and Harris’ sculptures are interwoven throughout the show while a bronze sculpture of two bears tangoing serves as the spindle. On its face, the vivid colors and conversation of textures and forms pull one in, like when one simply can’t look away from a beautiful woman. You might not know her character, education, or philosophical considerations, but on first impressions, you know that she’s beautiful. Beyond the surface of the show, as one glides along the concrete floor, one wonders what the story is that’s being told. We are often accustomed to art that asks something from us in order to pull out our appreciation. This is not the case with the dialogue between the landscapes of Frank and the sculptures of Harris. As I sat on the benches and circled my way around the exhibition, I asked myself, “What is the story that is to be told?” The intuitive answer was beauty for beauty’s sake, dynamism, a solid muse in static motion.
Kathleen Frank’s glossy oil paintings blend the realms of dreamscape and landscape. In On the Way to Santa Elena Canyon, Frank paints a still, low, and reflective river with cool, blue shadows and quiet contrasting patterns. As such, the work depicts what is closer to the inner landscape of Santa Elena Canyon than a visual impression. The underlayer of bright orange-red in her paintings peeks through the shades of blue and brings aliveness to a depiction of a moment in time. A more recent work by Frank, From Plaza Blanco, peels away another layer of “the real” as the widened path near the viewer narrows as if pulling one into a deserted wonderland far away from water. Yet still I want to go there. The landscape encourages a stilling of the self as if this stillness will conjure the truth behind the illusion.
The work of Mark Yale Harris has a pure innocence that is not without depth. An otherwise ferocious bear is depicted in a whimsical twirl, fish held above its head in celebration of the freshly caught trophy. Another sculpture relates the story of a relaxed bear, one paw lazily pinning his golden trophy to keep it from flopping away, its tail curved up as if still flipping. Harris’ sculptures shift from playful bears to a curved woman on her knees, hands crossed behind her head in a sculpture titled Awakening III Bleue. The woman kneels, not awakening from a prostrate slumber; rather, she emerges as if from a fetal position. In the New American West, she has the space to expand, the quietness to awaken her, and the heat of the sun to warm her. This woman unfurls as if reborn, like the many people who visit or move to the expansive West in order to finally be with themselves.
The interplay between the works of Frank and Harris are not only complementary in terms of balance and harmony between stillness and movement, substance and form, and a blend of textures and dimensions; there’s also a sense that Harris’ sculptures inhabit the realms of Frank’s paintings. Both artists address themes of nature and fantasy: unreal landscapes meet improbable scenarios with bears. They step beyond the realms of idealization and into the imaginal landscape. The color story is beautiful, both artists playing with oranges and blues. This contrast of color and medium creates a polarization, which serves as the dynamic tension point that keeps the show visually compelling.
The exhibition itself, for all its beauty, is still quite safe with the exception of two works by Frank. Hints of tension come from her painting Buffalo Roundup, in which two vaqueros, or cowboys, ride horses alongside a small herd of buffalo to keep them in line. The work is unexpected in conversation with the tranquility of the other landscape paintings and sculptures of dancing bears. Buffalo Roundup stings a little and opens the question whether this painting is meant to tell the story of an older time that foreshadows the tragic historic events of 1870-1884, when an estimated over 30 million bison, an integral lifeforce for the Native Americans of the Plains regions, were slaughtered. It’s unclear whether this painting is meant in pure innocence or as a defining point of tension in an otherwise tranquil show.
For all the exhibition establishes with its lively mood-setting, questions still linger. If this is the New American West, what is the Old West? The New West is a pastoral landscape where bears dance whimsically. We are left inferring about the Old West in contrast to the New imagined dreamscape. Is the Old West the time of the one horse town or a time before the “Big Hunt”? The questions are ultimately left unanswered as if echoing into the seemingly infinite openness of the canyons of the West.
The New American West – By Brush and by Bronze accomplishes beauty and dynamism. The works are approachable but with enough subtle tension to give one pause to think (but not too hard) about the realities of the American West for all its mystery and history, known and unknown. The play of stillness and movement, coolness and heat, imagined and literal make the conversation between Frank and Harris accessible. The Museum of the Big Bend attracts many tourists who are nature lovers and have appreciation for beauty but might not otherwise have an art degree, which is what makes The New American West – By Brush and by Bronze a smartly curated show with beauty and enough depth to make it interesting while still knowing its audience. There really is something to be said about beautiful art that doesn’t demand from its audience but a little consideration. Whatever happened to beauty for beauty’s sake? Or a poem for a tree that is simply a poem? This is the work shown in The New American West – By Brush and by Bronze.
The New American West – By Brush and by Bronze is on view through May 30, 2026, at the Museum of the Big Bend in Alpine, Texas.
