Robert Summers (Texas, b. 1940), "Best Friends", 1988, oil on panel

sight: 9 x 12 in., frame: 14 x 17 in.

Provenance: Property from the estate of a prominent San Antonio, Texas businessman

A resident of Glen Rose, Texas, Robert Summers is an oil painter and sculptor in realist style of contemporary western subjects, especially cattle ranching. He is the creator of numerous public art projects including the world's largest bronze for the Pioneer Plaza at the Dallas Convention Center. It has seventy longhorn steers and three horses and riders on a cattle drive. Completed in the mid 1990s, it took him two and a half years. As a child in Glen Rose, he took art lessons and was inspired by his father, a local judge and Frederic Remington buff. In his 20s, he worked with the Texas Highway Department and then with General Dynamic Aircraft, while working part time as an artist. Expressing desire to devote full time to his art career, he was supported for one year by a cousin, and by the late 1960s, he was achieving public success. In 1976, he was recognized as the official Texas Bicentennial Artist.