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Lot Essay
William Robinson Leigh wrote the following caption on the reverse of a photograph of the present work taken by Peter A. Juley & Sons: "Monument Valley is in the extreme northern part of Arizona. The distant ridges seen in the picture is the Henry Mountains of Utah. The valley constitutes one of the most striking results of the erosion to be found on earth. This is a mere fragment of it."
From an early age, Leigh showed immense talent as an artist, and through the financial help of his aunt and uncle, he was able to attend the Maryland Institute in Baltimore. He excelled at the Institute and in 1883, he enrolled at the Royal Academy in Munich, where he spent the next 12 years. From his Munich years, he emerged as an artist who was a superb draftsman with a strong sense of line, a vigorous brush technique with a high-keyed palette and compositions that were highly finished.
In 1906, Albert Goring, a former fellow Munich student, invited Leigh to visit New Mexico. Leigh desperately needed a new environment and fresh artistic stimulation, but could not afford the fare for the trip. At this time, the Santa Fe Railroad advertising division was sponsoring art expeditions to the west for their calendar series. Leigh appealed to the advertising manager and accepted a painting commission in trade for a railroad ticket. In September of that year, Leigh arrived in Laguna, New Mexico and ". . . thoroughly enchanted declared, 'I stood alone in a strange and thrilling scene. At last I was on the land where I was to prove whether I was fit -- worthy of the opportunity -- able to do it justice -- or just a dunderhead.' Once he was settled Laguna, all of the pieces fell into place: the Munich training that so strongly emphasized genre subjects, his own long-standing attraction to nature, and the new idea that he had adopted from [Thomas] Moran: that of producing truly native art." (William Robinson Leigh: Western Artist, pp. 86-7)
From an early age, Leigh showed immense talent as an artist, and through the financial help of his aunt and uncle, he was able to attend the Maryland Institute in Baltimore. He excelled at the Institute and in 1883, he enrolled at the Royal Academy in Munich, where he spent the next 12 years. From his Munich years, he emerged as an artist who was a superb draftsman with a strong sense of line, a vigorous brush technique with a high-keyed palette and compositions that were highly finished.
In 1906, Albert Goring, a former fellow Munich student, invited Leigh to visit New Mexico. Leigh desperately needed a new environment and fresh artistic stimulation, but could not afford the fare for the trip. At this time, the Santa Fe Railroad advertising division was sponsoring art expeditions to the west for their calendar series. Leigh appealed to the advertising manager and accepted a painting commission in trade for a railroad ticket. In September of that year, Leigh arrived in Laguna, New Mexico and ". . . thoroughly enchanted declared, 'I stood alone in a strange and thrilling scene. At last I was on the land where I was to prove whether I was fit -- worthy of the opportunity -- able to do it justice -- or just a dunderhead.' Once he was settled Laguna, all of the pieces fell into place: the Munich training that so strongly emphasized genre subjects, his own long-standing attraction to nature, and the new idea that he had adopted from [Thomas] Moran: that of producing truly native art." (William Robinson Leigh: Western Artist, pp. 86-7)