Lot Essay
Peter Moran, the youngest member of the well known family of American artists including Thomas Moran, was the first to venture from Philadelphia to the American West. His early career was marked by extensive work on animal studies and landscapes of the Pennsylvania countryside. Beginning in 1864, Moran made many trips West where he recorded the remarkable sights and experiences that this region had to offer. His artistic eye was no doubt sharpened by his companion, John G. Bourke, a "soldier-turned-ethnologist" (Kennedy Quarterly, vol V, no. 3, I, New York, May 1965, p. 175) with whom Moran traveled in 1881. Moran's early interest in animal painting and his later interest in the cultures of the southwest are evident in A Stampede--Pueblo of Jemez--New Mexico. Moran almost certainly observed such an event during his travels, and the careful handling of the herd and attention to the architectural detail attest to the impact that this occurence had on the artist.