Blazing a Trail
The art of El Paso’s famous son dots the landscape of the trail named for him
Tom Lea, according to Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Robert Caro, is “an unsung genius of our time who made it purely on the quality of his work.” To the people of El Paso, he’s a homegrown treasure as a muralist, novelist, illustrator, portraitist, landscapist, historian and war correspondent.
Now, his work has been formally recognized by the state. Legislation was signed into law by Governor Greg Abbott on June 12, 2017, estab- lishing the first artist heritage trail, the Tom Lea Trail, based on Italy’s Piero della Francesca Trail. The Tom Lea Trail takes you through a large swath of Texas across 12 Texas cities: Austin, College Station, Dallas, El Paso, Fredericksburg, Galveston, Hebbronville, Kingsville, Odessa, Seymour, Sweetwater and Waco.
Lea’s most viewed works may very well be the murals located in public buildings painted in the 1930s. He competed for these projects under the U.S. Treasury Department’s Section of Fine Arts, and they can be found across the United States. “The job I worked on the hardest, and learned the most while doing, and took the most pleasure in doing,” Lea noted, “was the Pass of the North mural for the federal courthouse in El Paso.” Other public projects can be found in the post offices in Odessa and Seymour.
MAKING A SCENE In Comanches (top), the expansive scene depicts three Comanche warriors racing across the prairie in a 1942 painting by Lea that now hangs in the Seymour Post Office. Meanwhile, Lea created Stampede (bottom), featuring Texas longhorns, in 1940. It hangs in the Ellen Noël Art Museum in Odessa.
Lea’s hometown of El Paso has the largest collection of his work at various sites around town. He sold most of his works to private collectors, so when the El Paso Museum decided to open a Tom Lea Gallery, a call was sent out
for individuals to share his works with the public. Today the El Paso Museum of Art is the home of the Tom Lea
Gallery where several of his works are on display. The museum owns over 130 works by Lea, which are rotated every two years. As for other trail locations that feature Lea’s art, the Texas Ranger Museum Hall of Fame and Museum in Waco is home to Yonder’s Fort Fisher and Here’s a Recruit. This depiction of a young man out on the untamed frontier is a great addition to the museum’s collection. And could there be a higher honor for a Texan than to have their work displayed in the state capitol in Austin? It’s the permanent home to Ranger Escort West of the Pecos, but this isn’t the only Tom Lea painting to hang in these hallowed halls. When George W. Bush was governor of Texas, Rio Grande hung is his office. This painting also went with him to the Oval Office at the White House.
SHELL SHOCK Lea’s That 2,000- Yard Stare is on display at the National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg.
In the picturesque Hill Country, hanging in the National Museum of the Pacific War is a reproduction of That 2,000-Yard Stare. This painting gives visitors a glimpse into the bloody beaches of Peleliu. The sketch for this paint- ing is just one of many he created during the four years as an eye-witness artist correspondent for Life magazine during World War II.
In 2015 and 2016, the Bullock Texas State History Museum in Austin featured an exhibit, Tom Lea: Chronicler of 20th Century America. “Illustrations, paintings, murals and writings together uniquely emphasize Lea’s contributions to American art, his inspirations, and often the people he knew and loved,” the museum noted. “His work ultimately influenced how audiences viewed landscapes as diverse as Pacific battlegrounds and the American Southwest.”
Take time to visit the website for the Tom Lea Institute and learn more about the Tom Lea Trail and the life of this noteworthy Texan.
