Rick Bartow

Rick Bartow
Schmaltz0 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source
Name	Rick Bartow
Birth date	December 16, 1946
Birth place	Newport, Oregon
Death date	April 2, 2016
Nationality	Wiyot, American
Known for	Painting, printmaking, sculpture
Notable works	The Raven Sparr (2009), We Were Always Here (2010)
Awards	National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, Eiteljorg Fellowship for Native American Fine Art

Rick Bartow

Rick Bartow was a Wiyot artist from Oregon celebrated for his paintings, prints, and monumental sculptures that fused Indigenous narrative, Surrealist transformation, and contemporary expression. His oeuvre addressed themes of identity, trauma, healing, and the human-animal interface, engaging institutions, museums, and public spaces across the United States. Bartow exhibited widely and received major fellowships while influencing contemporary Native American art dialogues in museums, biennials, and cultural institutions.

Early life and education

Born in Newport, Oregon, Bartow grew up in a family with Wiyot heritage and connections to Coos Bay, Salem, Oregon, and the Willamette Valley. He served in the United States Marine Corps during the Vietnam War, an experience that shaped his later confrontations with memory and survival in works shown in venues such as the Portland Art Museum and the Smithsonian Institution. After military service he attended art programs and workshops associated with institutions like the University of Oregon and the Pilchuck Glass School, studying alongside practitioners tied to the Northwest School and movements linked with Abstract Expressionism and Surrealism. Early mentors and local arts organizations in Portland, Oregon and on the Oregon Coast fostered his development in painting, printmaking, and carving.

Artistic career and style

Bartow's career spanned studio practice, print collaborations, gallery exhibitions, and public commissions. He worked in acrylic, oil, gouache, ink, woodcut, and mixed-media sculpture, drawing formal influence from Paul Cézanne, Francisco Goya, Frida Kahlo, and artists of the Fauves and Expressionism schools while engaging themes resonant with Native American narrative art. His figurative and zoomorphic imagery—often depicting bears, birds, elk, and hybrid human-animal figures—addressed cultural continuity, intergenerational trauma, and resilience evident in works shown at the Heard Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the National Museum of the American Indian. Bartow combined traditional carving techniques with modernist pictorial strategies, producing mask-like faces, totemic sculptures, and layered prints that referenced ceremonial objects associated with tribes such as the Wiyot and neighboring coastal peoples. Critics compared his psychological intensity to the work of Edvard Munch and the transformative mythic register of Joseph Beuys while curators situated his practice within contemporary Native art dialogues alongside artists represented by the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts.

Major works and exhibitions

Major works by Bartow include large-scale sculptures and series of prints and paintings that toured institutions and biennials. His monumental installation The Raven Sparr (2009) and the public commission We Were Always Here (2010) became focal points in exhibitions at museums such as the Portland Art Museum, the Seattle Art Museum, and the Rubin Center for the Visual Arts. Solo exhibitions at the Crocker Art Museum, the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art, and the Hallie Ford Museum of Art showcased bodies of work linking personal narrative to regional histories. Bartow participated in group exhibitions with contemporary Native artists at the National Museum of the American Indian, the Denver Art Museum, and curated shows that traveled through networks including the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Autry Museum of the American West. Print portfolios created with print workshops at institutions like the Tamarind Institute and collaborations with master printers were exhibited in galleries in New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago.

Collections and public installations

Bartow’s work is held in major public collections including the National Gallery of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Institution, the Portland Art Museum, the Seattle Art Museum, and the Heard Museum. His public sculptures and installations appear in civic settings and museum plazas, with commissions facilitated by organizations such as the Seattle Office of Arts & Culture and the Oregon Arts Commission. Academic and cultural institutions—Oregon State University, the University of Washington, and the Museum of Modern Art—have acquired examples of his prints and paintings. Major acquisitions by the Eiteljorg Museum and the Crocker Art Museum helped raise Bartow’s profile within collecting networks that include private foundations and municipal arts programs. His works have been included in traveling exhibitions organized by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service and programs associated with the National Endowment for the Arts.

Personal life and legacy

Bartow lived and worked on the Oregon Coast and maintained ties to tribal communities and arts organizations across the Pacific Northwest, including partnerships with the Oregon Historical Society and local tribal councils. He received awards and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, and regional arts councils, and his career influenced younger generations of Native artists exhibited alongside figures from institutions such as the Institute of American Indian Arts. After his death in 2016, retrospectives and memorial exhibitions at institutions like the Portland Art Museum and the Eiteljorg Museum reaffirmed his role in shaping contemporary Indigenous visual culture. His hybrid forms, evocative narratives, and public commissions continue to be studied in dialogues linking museums, universities, and tribal programs, securing his standing in histories of late 20th- and early 21st-century American art.

Category:Native American artists Category:Artists from Oregon