Julian Onderdonk – Texas Impressionist
Today we went to the Witte museum to see the bluebonnet paintings of famed Texas Impressionist, Julian Onderdonk.
Growing up in San Antonio in the late 1800’s, he studied art at Long Island, New York from the same art teacher his father had.
His sister Eleanor, who studied art from the same teacher, was portrayed by a reenactor who shared about her brother’s artwork.
Specializing in miniatures herself, she eventually became curator for the Witte Museum.
Impressionist Art Characteristics
We haven’t officially studied impressionistic art, since we are only up to the 1820’s in world history.
Therefore my family was a bit confused by the blurry art when we walked into the gallery.
I explained to them that impressionistic art purposely looks blurry, because it’s meant to be viewed from a distance.
Early Scenes of San Antonio
Onderdonk painted scenes of many places in and around San Antonio that look drastically different today.
One spot was Alamo Heights, which in the early 1920’s was a field of cactus and bluebonnets. Today it is a busy metropolitan area.
We also viewed scenes of the missions, the San Antonio River, the Guenther flour mill, and more.
Paintings of Bluebonnets
Like Monet’s famous Water Lilies painted at different times of the day, Onderdonk painted bluebonnets from morning to midday to twilight.
Monet also has a series of bridges in different types of weather, likewise the bluebonnets ranged in settings from sunny to foggy to rainy to the one of dark clouds rolling across the sky due to an impending storm.
That piece moved me the most. I could feel the gush of cool air blow up, the flowers and grasses waving frantically in the gale, and the fear of the storm’s severity.
Additionally, Onderdonk painted scenes from where he was trained in Long Island, New York City, and even the Thousand Islands.
Of that set my favorite was even a sketch of Washington’s headquarters in New York City!
Lafayette Sighting in Texas
As we walked around and looked at the various paintings at our leisure, I noticed a beautiful scene of bluebonnets in La Grange, Fayette County, Texas.
I didn’t realize Texas had a county named after the Marquis de Lafayette!
La Grange was the name of one of his homes in France.
By the time I reached the other end of the room, the kids called to me in hushed enthusiasm, “Mom! Mom! Come here! Look at the sign…La Grange, Fayette County, Texas!”
(I was smiling from ear to ear!)
It was fun listening to them talk to each other. “It’s named after Lafayette!” “Well sort of.” My son fixed that problem! He took his fingers and covered “Grange” so it would read “La Fayette.”
Once again we discovered Lafayette is everywhere!
