National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum, Oklahoma City, OK June 6-August 3
Always one of the most anticipated shows of the year, the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum’s 53rd Prix de West Invitational Art Exhibition & Sale is hosting its art sale weekend June 20 and 21. This year, nearly 100 artists are expected to attend. From perennial favorites such as Josh Elliott and Daniel Gerhartz to newcomers like S.M. Chavez, Tony Hochstetler, Denis Milhomme and Joshua Tobey, the array of paintings and sculptures promises to be a feast for the eyes.
Events include a fixed-price art sale, art seminars, workshops, cocktail receptions and an awards dinner on Saturday, June 21. Online options for viewing and purchasing art will be available for those who cannot attend in person. The artworks themselves will be on exhibit for viewers to enjoy from June 6 to August 3. Aptly summing up the mission and atmosphere of the Prix, Susan Roeder, board member and Prix de West Committee Chair says, “This event showcases the remarkable talent of artists who capture the spirit of the people, the majestic landscapes and diverse wildlife of the West. We invite art enthusiasts to explore this extraordinary collection of paintings and sculptures.”
Extraordinary collection, indeed. Looking at just a few of the many outstanding artworks in the show offers an idea of the range and quality to be found. ANCIENT STORY TELLERS, for example, is an unusual and resonant painting from Joe Bohler. In the painting, a raven, one of the principal arbiters of creation in the Indigenous world view, flies past timeless petroglyphs on a worn canyon wall. In capturing this moment of synergy, Bohler shows the eternal present, in the form of the raven, animating the distant past, represented by the petroglyphs. It’s a neat composition and a painting that makes you think.
In a similarly subtle set of contrasts, the scorched trunks of trees frame a snow-dusted peak that slopes down to the river’s edge in Josh Elliott’s BEAUTY FROM ASHES, RED EAGLE MOUNTAIN. This is a painting about time, cyclical time as it toggles from beauty to destruction and back to beauty again, fire feeding the earth and, ultimately, making mountains rise and fall. Beneath this deep, geological time, the flow of the river and the shadows of clouds on the mountain tell the hour by today’s clock.
For immediacy, look no further than Terri Kelly Moyers’s SUN SPOT, a study in texture, light and a limited palette that reveals the various beauties of a winter’s day. In a classic compositional triangle, two sparrows on a tangle of snow-covered branches hover above a rabbit that, perhaps, has been drawn out of its burrow to forage by the relative warmth of the sun. That the pair of sparrows and the rabbit crowd into the “sun spot” lets us know that we aren’t the only ones who could use a little vitamin D during the winter months.
Just as we can all use some sun in January, we can all use a dose of fresh art in June. The Prix de West is precisely what the doctor ordered. —James D. Balestrieri
Contact Information(405) 478-2250pdw.nationalcowboymuseum.org
This story appeared in the June/July 2025 issue of Southwest Art magazine. Subscribe today to read every issue in its entirety.
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