Come - Desert Magazine of the Southwest

WESTERN ART
"Winter Morning"
Oil, 24" x 30"
Artist, William Hoffman.
Courtesy Dr. Leo Hartman
Collection,
of Bellflower, Calif.
CAN A SMALL GROUP
OF AMERICAN INDIAN AND COWBOY ARTISTS
FIND HAPPINESS IN A LITTLE WESTERN TOWN
SNUGGLED AT THE FOOTHILLS OF THE
SAN GABRIEL MOUNTAINS?
YOU BET THEY CAN!
PIRST IT was the land of the Gabrielinos
Indians; then a Mexican Land
Grant to Don Ignacio Palomeres; an
enormous cattle ranch; a prolific citrus
grove, and now a mecca of great western
art. To this add very alive townspeople
and you have the history and future of
San Dimas, California — population
19,500, 40 miles east of Los Angeles, a
24
friendly western town dedicated to the
development of western art. These very
alive townspeople have developed and
incorporated a community-wide organization,
"The San Dimas Festival of
Western Arts." They like to bring attention
to the "Arts," "plural" they say,
visual, performing and literature.
For the present, the "Arts" is their
ftlCft JOFFKA^J
annual sponsorship of the prestigious
American Indian and Cowboy Artists
(AICA) Western Art Exhibition. It is
California's largest and most spectacular
exhibition of western art. For the future,
they plan western art galleries and the
building of an academy devoted to western
art and history. They have the
dream, and they have a committed
Desert/April 1979