Bert Geer Phillips (American, 1868 to 1956)
Bert Phillips is considered one of the founders of the Taos art colony, and enjoyed a successful career painting western illustrations using models that were half-Sioux, Spanish-American, and cowboys which he painted in western landscapes. At sixteen he left his home in Hudson, NY for five years of study at the Art Students League and the National Academy of Design, and later spent several years in New York painting and producing commercial illustrations. In the summer of 1915, Phillips, along with Blumenschein, Couse, Sharp, Berninghaus, and Dunton, joined to form the now famous Taos Society of Artists.
Information courtesy of Cowan’s Auctions Inc., June 2006.