House of Joy

Description

House of Joy

30″x40″

oil on canvas.

The Inspiration

To become a cowboy all you needed was guts and a horse! If you had guts you could always steal the horse.

It only took a couple of decades in the old West and cowboys became immortal as American folk heroes. They were called legends in Levi’s. They were independent, hard-working and self-reliant. They made tracks in history that the farmer could never plow under.

However, the word cowboy has come to represent gunfighters, gamblers, outlaws and real cowboys. The characteristic wide-brimmed Stetsons were utilitarian. The cowboy hat was used for multi purposes. It served as a water pitcher for them and their horse, to fan fires, and to keep the dust, sun and rain off their heads. A Cowboys favorite phrase is “Most folks dress-up but cowboys dress down.” A cowboy rode a $10 horse and a $40 saddle.”

However, the real talent a cowboy has in making a horse performs is the “lightness of hand” on the part of the horseman.

The lariat or rope was the most important tool of the cowboy. A rope enabled a 150 pound man on a horse to easily throw a 1000 pound cow.

However it was the horses that made the cowboy. The range mongrel or Mustang was a sturdy unhampered descendant of the early Spanish breeds.

A man on a horse is historically superior to a foot soldier. Fifty Spanish conquistadors, men mounted on extremely well-trained horses conquered the whole Aztec empire of hundreds of thousands of people!