Bob Moline (Texas / Oklahoma, b. 1938), "Winter Companions", watercolor on watercolor paper, signed lower left, with customer tooled leather accent on the verso gifted by the artist to present owner

sight: 22 x 29 in., frame: 33 x 40 in.

Provenance: Property from a collector in Claude, Texas; purchased directly from the artist

Bob Moline is a largely self-taught Western artist and master saddlemaker whose artistic training grew from a lifetime immersed in horses, ranching, and the traditions of the American West. Of Comanche and Pawnee ancestry, he developed his knowledge of cowboy life through his father, a horse trader, work on West Texas ranches, and 14 years at Ryon’s Saddle Shop in Fort Worth, where he became foreman and refined his leather-tooling and drawing skills. His ability to render anatomically accurate horses led to early commissions for Ryon’s Western Store and the Paint Horse Journal, eventually developing into a career as a painter. Moline is known for highly realistic depictions of cowboys, Native Americans, horses, cattle, and ranch life, drawing on firsthand experience to capture the color, texture, movement, and atmosphere of the American West. He has also experimented with looser, impressionistic techniques. His work appeared in XIT, The American Cowboy, The Texas Cowboys, and Saddle Songs: A Cowboy Songbag, and he exhibited extensively across the country. In 1994, his impressionistic chuck wagon scene received the Governor’s Purchase Award at the Cheyenne Frontier Days Art Show and Sale and entered the permanent collection of the Cheyenne Frontier Days Old West Museum.