On Thursday, Navajo artist R C Gorman, famous for his voluptuous and graceful depiction of Indian women in his paintings, died at the age of 74 of pneumonia, compounded by a blood infection.
Gorman, who had been dubbed the 'Native American Picasso', was known for his partiality towards Navajo women, who he would often drape in a blanket or a shawl. “I don't draw the 'ideal' woman who would fit in Playboy bunny underwear. Most women aren't like that. I draw beautiful women who are sometimes fat and have calluses on their feet,” he had once said in an interview. New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, while announcing that Gorman passed away at the University Hospital in Albuquerque, said, “New Mexico loses a great citizen and the world loses a great artist”.
Among Gorman's more famous fans are Hollywood actors Arnold Schwarzenegger, Danny DeVito, Elizabeth Taylor, Gregory Peck and Lee Marvin, and author Erma Bombeck. His works were sought after in the political circles too with the late Jackie Onassis Kennedy being one of his fans. Late painter and filmmaker Andy Warhol was so impressed with Gorman that he had painted the Navajo artist himself.
Rudolph Carl Gorman was born on July 26, 1931, in Arizona to artist and Navajo code talker Carl Gorman and Adele Katherine Brown. Gorman's interest in art began early in life, with him drawing on the rocks and the ground at the tender age of three.
According to Gorman, his schoolteacher Jenny Lind from the Ganado Presbyterian Mission School in Arizona helped shape his interest in art. “She gave me lessons in art history and different mediums and always encouraged me. I guess she was the most influential teacher that I ever had,” Gorman had said.
Later, the artist served in the Navy before enrolling in the Northern Arizona University for literature and minors in art course. After studying art in Mexico City College in 1958 through a scholarship by the Navajo Tribal Council, he opened his own gallery, called Navajo Gallery, in Taos, New Mexico in 1968. Gorman's works caught on and in 1986, San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein announced March 19 as 'Gorman Day'.
Two of Gorman's paintings were exhibited at the 'Masterworks of the Museum of the American Indian' at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City in 1973, with one of the paintings gracing the cover of the exhibition's catalog.
Asked why he preferred painting large women he had once said, “I am not obsessed with large women or even skinny women, but I do prefer to paint women. I'm attracted to them. And large women, they fill up the paper more.”
Meanwhile, condolences for the artist's death poured in. Institute of American Indian Arts' president Della Warrior said, “He made some new paths for Native artists and inspired Native students to become artists because he was so successful. We're very saddened by the loss of such a great artist.” New Mexico Cultural Affairs Secretary Stuart Ashman said, “His color and his whimsy, the way he celebrated Native American women in particular, and the way he elevated the figures to an art form, really, was tremendous.”
Gorman's sister Zonnie Gorman in a statement said that her brother never lost touch with his Navajo soul. “He never lost touch with his roots, and that kept him very humble. His soul emanates in his work, whether it was a beautiful scene with mountains and canyons, women or whether it was a simple sketch. Although R C the man is no longer with us, his spirit will never die,” she said.
