About Us

Gallery

Business Policies

Contact

Home

“Study for Cabezon”

A unique and exceptional original oil on canvas final painting study for

a Federal WPA Art Project United States Courthouse Mural in Santa Fe, New Mexico by William Penhallow Henderson, c.1935

ex: William Penhallow Henderson Collection, Santa Fe, NM

This is one of the most unique and historically significant Southwestern paintings by one of the most distinguished historic Southwestern artists that we have ever had the privilege of owning. It is the artist’s final oil painting study for one of America’s largest, most beautiful and most historic paintings, a gigantic seven feet, three inches by eight feet, eight inches mural painting of Cabezon Peak, a majestic, iconic 2,000 foot tall rocky Volcanic plug outcropping in the Rio Puerco Valley in West Central New Mexico some 100 or so miles due west of Santa Fe, New Mexico. At the time that renowned Santa Fe artist, William Penhallow Henderson (1877-1943) painted this study and the mural in the mid-1930’s there was a tiny, rural village nestled at the foot of Cabezon Peak known as “Cabezon” which is pastorally and peacefully depicted in the painting study and in the Courthouse mural and

which today some 85 years later is now essentially a deserted ghost town.

The Santiago E. Campos United States Federal Courthouse on Federal Place in Santa Fe, shown here, is a

historic American art lover’s dream endowed with an astounding collection of six extremely large Works

Progress Administration-era painted murals on canvas painted between 1933 and1938 by the prominent Santa Fe artist, architect and furniture maker, William Penhallow Henderson, of which this piece is one of the finest and most beautiful, in our opinions. Henderson received the Federal Government’s WPA commission in 1933 and over

the next five years conceived and created these six magnificent large murals portraying iconic local New Mexico landscape scenes such as the famous Cabezon Peak.

Above left, a view of the Cabezon Peak, a dramatic, nearly 2,000 foot high volcanic core outcropping in the Rio Puerco Valley of New Mexico, approximately 100 miles west of Santa Fe. “Cabezon” in Spanish translates to “Big Head” in English. As can be easily seen, Henderson took some artistic license here and altered the appearance of this peak in a beautiful, Impressionistically-styled manner for his painting and mural. Above right, the San Jose Church and the old cemetary in the now-deserted ghost town of Cabezon, New Mexico in the shadow of Cabezon Peak.

Left photo source and © New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science. Right photo source and © El Chuqueno.

Two brief biographies of William Penhallow Henderson

Born Medford, MA 1877-died Tesuque, NM 1943

Painter, architect. Henderson grew up in Medford, Massachusetts, on a cattle ranch in Texas, and in a small Kansas town. Studies at the Massachusetts Normal Art School and Boston Museum of Fine Arts prefaced European travel and further art training abroad. In 1916, after more than a decade teaching and painting in Chicago, Henderson moved to Santa Fe with his wife, the poet and editor Alice Corbin. There his interest in the Indian and Hispanic residents of the Southwest inspired work in several media.

Best known are his pastels and oils, less so his murals, handcrafted furniture, stage designs, and innovative architectural projects. As an illustrator, he was noted for his work on novels and scholarly studies focusing on the Southwest, including his wife's classic, Brothers of Light: The Penitentes of the Southwest. Henderson's emotive, high-keyed color and decorative spatial treatment suggest Post-Impressionism applied to distinctly southwestern imagery. His work was an inspiration to avant-garde as well as conservative painters in the Southwest.

-Text source and © Smithsonian American Art Museum

“Gorgeous New Mexican landscapes brought right into the courthouse.”

-Santa Fe New Mexican, c. 1938

“After all, it is best out here so why not use it?”

-William Penhallow Henderson

Above left, the original Santa Fe home and art studio complex of William Penhallow Henderson and Alice Corbin Henderson on Camino del Monte Sol in Santa Fe which is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Below left, Henderson's original pencil drawing for the sign of his Pueblo Spanish Building Company on Camino del Monte Sol. Above right, Willam Penhallow Henderson and his wife Alice Corbin Henderson, 1932. The Hendersons and their only daughter, Alice Oliver Henderson are buried together in a family plot in the historic Fairview Cemetery in Santa Fe, as seen below.

Top left photo source and © by Simone Frances, courtesy of The Historic Santa Fe Foundation. Right photo source and © Palace of the Governors Photo Archives, Santa Fe, NM.

The painting study is done in oil on canvas and it measures 16" in height by 20" in width (sight) and the framed dimensions are 19 1/2" by 23 1/2". The painting is in completely excellent original condition with no restoration

or in-painting in evidence under a thorough UV-light examination, and quite remarkably so for its 90 or so years

of age. The painting is unsigned which is not at all unusual for Henderson who often did not sign his paintings and especially so given that he had no intention of selling this painting study, clearly wanting to keep it for himself.

The painting study and its mural are done in a highly-impressionistic manner both in terms of their overall composition and color palette reflecting the direct and substantial artistic influence the French Impressionists had on Henderson. As a young man, Henderson traveled widely in Europe on a Paige Art Scholarship in the very first years of the 20th Century where he was deeply influenced in Paris by the then ground-breaking, radical

work of these French Impressionists, most importantly Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Claude Monet.

Henderson’s painting study varies from the courthouse mural only very slightly in design, the color palette of

the Courthouse mural is considerably brighter with additional blues, greens and purple hues added particularly

in the sky where this study is done primarily in a more subdued palette of darker reddish-brown sepia tones and though the color palette of the two pieces is somewhat different, the beautifully-subtle, sophisticated, complex color values and their striking tonal relationship to each other are exactly the same. In both the painting study and the mural the entrie scene is gorgeously and completely suffused with color and light, the Cabezon peak and its surrounding hills, mesas and sky appearing almost to be illuminated or glowing from within.

As previously mentioned, artistically, both the painting study and the finished mural are somewhat stylized Impressionistic interpretations and presentations of Cabezon Peak and its surroundings as can be seen in the

photo of the actual peak pictured above. One very small further detail is different between the study and finished mural, a horse or mule drawn covered wagon driving towards the peak was added by Henderson in the far lower left of the Courthouse mural version. The painting study’s beautifully hand-carved original gold metal leaf gilded frame is made very much in the style of Henderson’s hand-carved New Mexican furniture and it is very possible that Henderson made this frame himself in his well-known local Santa Fe furniture shop and architectural studio,

The Spanish and Pueblo Building Company, but we can not know this for certain.

As a historically important additional artistic bonus, included in the sale of this original oil on canvas mural painting study will be William Penhallow Henderson’s original initial preliminary pencil drawing study for this oil study itself, which is shown here just below. This very early preliminary study is done in graphite on a sheet of light yellow architectural tracing paper or paper vellum and it measures 16 1/4" in height by 20" in width (sight). The framed dimensions are 23 3/4" by 27 1/2". The drawing is also in excellent original condition. Seen together, these two studies, the early graphite on paper and the subsequent oil on canvas, demonstrate the artist’s

creative design process in a unique and fascinating manner.

These six large Henderson murals are still on proud display in their original installations today here in Santa Fe’s Federal Courthouse where they are considered to be and valued as some of the region’s and the country’s most important and historically significant artistic and cultural treasures. This painting study is the actual presentation piece which Henderson would have personally shown to the U.S. Government’s WPA art administrators for their final approval before proceeding to paint the giant mural painting for the Federal Courthouse.

Significantly, this painting study’s interesting history continues long after the the Federal Courthouse murals were completed in 1938. Henderson kept this painting study for himself in his own personal family collection until his death in 1943 when it passed to his wife, Alice Corbin Henderson (1881-1949) who likewise kept it until her death at which point it passed to the Henderson’s only daughter, Alice Oliver Henderson (1907-1988) who later passed it on in turn to her daughter and surviving Henderson estate Heir, Letitia Evans Frank (1926-2009) who finally sold it in the 1980’s some fifty years after the Courthouse murals were completed, through the prominent Owings-Dewey Fine Art gallery in Santa Fe who sold it to an important private New Mexico art collector.

After this collector's death a couple of years ago, we acquired the painting study from his estate.

Interestingly, the drawing has a feature clearly added later in a reddish-colored pencil or pastel, which is the addition of the horse or mule drawn wagon in the lower left corner headed towards the Cabezon, a feature which eventually becomes part of the finished courthouse mural, but is not present in this oil painting study for it.

The drawing is also divided or sectioned off by a very precisely executed grid structure done in light pencil, divided into sections to use as a precise guide for executing the very large mural.

Henderson almost certainly used this drawing pinned to the wall or on an easel as a guide while painting the mural as evidenced by both the grid structure overlaid on to the drawing and the pin holes in the corners of the drawing. It is a near certainty that he also used this oil painting study as a reference guide while painting the mural for overall composition, comparative color values and tonalities. Where Henderson actually painted these Courthouse murals is the subject of some interest and speculation. Certainly, some or all of them could have been painted on site at the Courthouse, but since they are painted on very large stretched canvases, they were portable and could have very possibly been painted at another location such as Henderson's nearby art studio on Camino del Monte Sol a fairly short two miles distance from the Federal Courthouse. Painting them in his own private art studio would have afforded Henderson a much more controlled circumstances and privacy than having to paint them on the walls or in the premises of a large public building.

There is some concrete evidence to this possibility as well. Some years ago, we were graciously invited to visit

and tour Henderson's former studio on Camino del Monte Sol which is now the personal residence of one of Henderson's great-grandsons. While looking around the sudio, we noticed in the main room that there was a very long and prominently placed vertical slot or passageway cut completely through the wall, about twelve feet tall by perhaps 8-10 inches wide. When we inquired about this, our host explained that Henderson had purposely had this slot cut through the studio wall to facilitate the passage of large stretched canvases, such as these murals, safely out of the studio for transportation elsewhere. Moving the mural paintings the fairly short distance from Henderson's studio to the Federal Courthouse could have been easily accomplished on foot or by wagon or truck.

As we mentioned earlier, this unique painting study and its accompanying preliminary pencil drawing are beautiful, iconic and uniquely significant prized works of historic New Mexico art and they should be valued, appreciated and cared for as such. This painting is an extremely important part of Santa Fe's and New Mexico's long and distinguised history and heritage. We have been very happy and privileged to have had the opportunity to have lived with and enjoyed these important, historic pieces for a time and we know that their next fortunate owners and custodians, whether they are a Museum or private collectors, will feel exactly the same way.

Price available upon request

Inquire

PROVENANCE:

William Penhallow Henderson, Alice Corbin Henderson

and Henderson Family Collection, Santa Fe, NM c. 1935-c. 1980’s

William Penhallow Henderson Estate, Santa Fe, NM, c. 1980’s

Owings-Dewey Fine Art, Santa Fe, NM, c. 1980’s

Private Collection, NM, c. 1980’s-2023

Fine Arts of the Southwest Collection, Santa Fe, NM, 2023-Present

At left, Henderson's preliminary pencil study for the Cabezon oil painting and mural. At right, a detail showing the later added feature of a horse or mule drawn wagon which also appears in the finished Courthouse mural.

The Cabezon painting study on display with dramatic lighting from below.

William Penhallow Henderson and his wife Alice Corbin Henderson were founders and principal members of the local art community. Their home, built from 1917 through 1928 in the Spanish Pueblo Revival Style, served as a model for other homes built by members of Santa Fe’s growing art colony. Gradually, other artists and writers settled around the Hendersons’ home on Camino del Monte Sol (Road of the Sun Mountain), becoming a prominent enclave for the Santa Fe art colony.

In addition to his accomplishments as a painter, Henderson was a lay architect whose commissions included building the White sisters’ compound El Delirio (now the School for Advanced Research) on Garcia Street; the Museum of Navajo Ceremonial Art (now the Wheelwright Museum), in the form of a Navajo hogan; the Santa Fe Railroad ticket office on the Santa Fe Plaza; the Edwin Brooks House on Canyon Road; the Fremont Ellis House, also on Canyon Road; and the Albert Schmidt Residence in Tesuque.

-Text source and © "Old Santa Fe Today" by Audra Bellmore with photographs

by Simone Frances, courtesy of The Historic Santa Fe Foundation

The verso of the painting showing W.P. Henderson Estate labels and stamp and Owings-Dewey Fine Art gallery labels.