Process and Purpose

Bobby Beals presents the first solo exhibition of Coulter Prehm’s work in a decade, opening with a special culinary collaboration.

By John O’Hern

In 2008, not long after moving to Santa Fe, New Mexico, I wrote an article for this magazine on the Ryder Studio School established by Anthony Ryder here the year before. At the time, I met one of the young artists, Coulter (Colt) Prehm, who had recently moved from Iowa to Santa Fe with his wife, Liz, to study at the school. Colt spent several years under Tony Ryder’s tutelage as well as a year as his teaching assistant.

God and Guns, 2023, oil on panel, 23 x 36"

Over the years he and I have gotten together occasionally for lunch or breakfast to talk art and to catch up on each other’s lives. Recently, we got together to talk about his upcoming exhibition, Observance, at the Horseshoe Gallery at Bishop’s Lodge in Santa Fe.

Observance is a fitting title for the exhibition, referring back to Tony Ryder’s emphasis on observing and drawing what we actually see. Tony says a student draws “what he thinks he sees. His thought process stands at the very center of his ability to draw. If you wish to learn to draw you must therefore become aware of what you’re thinking as you draw.” The exhibition is also a celebration of Colt’s first solo exhibition in more than a decade—a period of introspection, experimentation and growth.

Studies and completed God and Guns.

Colt painting Mary on site.

His college career at Iowa State University began badly when, as a biology major, he flunked out. He applied for readmission to the university and decided to apply as a fine art major. Since he had satisfied his general education requirements he filled his schedule with art classes, beginning with drawing and painting. After the first day of a drawing class, he called his mother and told her “I think I’ve found what I’m supposed to do.

“I was painting and drawing obsessively,” he recalls. “I had rented a hole-in-the-wall apartment and there was space in the basement of the place where I was living that I made into a studio. Studying for my BFA I told my mentor that I thought I might go on for a master’s degree. He said, ‘Get out of the university system. Go study with a master.’ I didn’t know that was a possibility.

The Way Home, 2023, oil on panel, 121/4 x 101/2"

“He told me to look into Tony Ryder. I wrote to Tony and said ‘I want to study with you for two years. I was surprised when Tony actually wrote back. He said, ‘How about we start with two weeks?’ In 2007, the summer before I graduated, I took a workshop in Santa Fe. At the end, Tony said, ‘If you still want to come for two years, come down.’ I bought his book, The Artist’s Complete Guide to Figure Drawing: A Contemporary Perspective On the Classical Tradition, and tried to learn what he was teaching.

“I was offered a tattoo apprenticeship and began tattooing to make money when I was still in college. It still serves that purpose. Within a couple of years I was tattooing only my own designs.”

Rock Study, 2011, oil on panel, 51/2 x 41/2". Private collection.

In 2011, Prehm was selected for the Hudson River Fellowship, an extension of the programs of New York City’s Grand Central Atelier, founded by Jacob Collins. Part of its mission statement states, “Ideally, these artists and their beautiful representations of nature will help to lead the culture back to a stronger connection with the landscape. The fellowship seeks to make a contribution to both the art world and the conservation movement.” Colt comments, “Some of the best painters were juried in. I don’t know how I got in because everyone was a better painter. We painted all day.”

Colt’s tattoo of peonies for Bobby Beals.

I acquired a study of rocks that Colt painted during the fellowship. It reminded me of the studies done by 19th-century Hudson River School painters, so I asked the framer to combine various profiles of frame stock to create a contemporary interpretation of a 19th-century frame.

Art consultant Bobby Beals is creating a series of exhibitions, Bobby Beals Presents, in the Horseshoe Gallery. The exhibitions include demonstrations, curated special events and culinary experiences. Observance opens July 8 and continues through July 18. The opening will be followed by a reservation-only dinner at the Auberge Resort Collection’s SkyFire restaurant at Bishop’s Lodge. The menu is a collaboration between Colt and the resort’s executive chef, Pablo Peñalosa. Bobby notes, “These two artists created a menu that will share the process of their artwork.”

Graphite study for Concept vs. Reality.

Concept vs. Reality (detail)

“Process” is an underlying theme of the exhibition. Colt relates, “Bobby and I talked about the show and I started making three paintings. I hated all of them. Then it sort of struck me—the show needs to sum up my process of painting from life, from observation.”

Among the demonstrations of process in the exhibition are the preparatory paintings for his finished work, God and Guns, including a background study of mountains silhouetted against the sunset done from his imagination.

A work in progress is Mary, a painting of a roadside memorial to the victim of an automobile accident. Colt began painting it on an overcast day. Since there are few overcast days in Santa Fe, he has to wait until the rare day arrives to go back to work on the painting. He considered erecting a tent but felt the light coming through the tent would change the color temperature. Over the year and a half since he made his first drawing of the subject, the artificial flowers have faded and been replaced, adding another challenge to his finishing the painting.

Portrait Study in the manner of the Ryder Studio School.

The process includes drawings, often with scribbled thoughts relating to the subject. On the window sill of the studio in his home are a plaster hand and a shell. For Colt, the hand recalled Michelangelo’s hand of God in The Creation of Adam. The shell became a “divinely manifested wild amazing thing, way more amazing than the concept.” On the drawing he wrote, “Our ideas of the creative force, the divine touch, are mere concepts and fall utterly short of the experience of this power; its witnessing of the miracle of creation—light, form, life.”

He addresses challenges, process and purpose in a statement for the exhibition:

“All humans, all creatures on the planet even, are participating in a shared experience of life and reality; my work is centered on an intentional observance of life and light and, hopefully, truth and the desire to share this very personal perspective with others. This is full of challenges. How do we actually share our internal journey in a way that is communicative and useful? At this time, I feel that the best way forward is to think only of creating to the best of my ability with the hope that thoughtfulness coupled with creative work will eventually lead to the actualizing of my deepest desire for my art; that in the long term my work would affect the human community in a positive and meaningful way.” —

Observance
When: July 8-July 18, 2023
Where: Bishop’s Lodge, Horseshoe Gallery, 1297 Bishop’s Lodge Road, Santa Fe, NM 87506
Info: www.bealsandco.com