Local sculptor carries on cowboy art tradition

By JACOB DORAN

Bigfork Eagle

When it comes to sculpting the American West, Bob Stayton has become a legend in his own time.

One of the last true cowboy artists, Stayton began sculpting at the age of 53, choosing to draw upon the experiences of his own, eventful life, as inspiration.

In Stayton, art merges with history, and sculpture becomes a medium through which he, the storyteller, communicates and preserves the images and lessons of the past. In fact, there is a story behind every piece.

Stayton sees his goal as capturing the minutest details of that story, in order to communicate it to the viewer with the most powerful, true-to-life imagery. And, if that's not enough, he writes the story out and passes it on to anyone who purchases one of his pieces.

So pointed is the history and imagery, which his work conveys, that people often ask him where the stories come from. For Stayton, who feels a deep connection with the history, as much as with the art, the stories are the easy part.

He still remembers the day, at 53 years of age, that he walked into that West Coast foundry with his youngest son and purchased all the supplies that he thought he would need.

"What are you going to do with it?" his son had asked.

"I've had an interesting life," Stayton replied. "I'll do my life. I'll sculpt my memories and my own experiences."

Stayton had spent his entire 30-year career in the architectural and commercial/interior design business, for which he held an I.B.D. certification. In fact, he graduated from Montana State University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial, Commercial and Interior Design.

For years, he and his wife, Mary, owned an architectural commercial/interior design firm with offices in Billings and Great Falls. Even after selling the firm, he worked as the CEO of a large architectural interior design business on the West Coast.

Even so, it was art that he loved.

As a child, he recalls having drawn pictures on the backs of visitors cards, whenever he attended church with his parents. Acting upon the advice of the minister, the family pulled together to come up with the fifteen cents necessary to pay for a three-hour art lesson, each week. In 1935, fifteen cents a week was a real sacrifice, but it was worth every penny to see the drawings and watercolors of the scenery, wildlife and farm animals, which were the subjects that he chose to depict in his beginning years.

His art teacher laid the groundwork for his attention to detail by handing him a pencil and paper, and then telling him to draw his shoe from memory. Realizing that he never really paid attention to what his shoe looked like, his teacher taught him the importance of seeing everything in his world as being full of marvelous details that are easily missed.

Of course, Stayton's favorite details had been the ones that surrounded him every day, as he grew up on the small farm in the eastern foothills, south of Great Falls. In particular, he loved to observe the farm animals—the way that their muscles moved when they walked, ran and played—the wonderful details of their forms, so well suited to their individual needs.

Naturally, horses dominated his youth. He became an accomplished rider, early on. As a teenager, he worked on nearby ranches, as well as a large, quarter million acre ranch in southern MT, where he spent his weekends. In addition, he apprenticed as a jockey and spent the winter months working in a saddle shop.

It is not surprising, then, to note that wildlife and horses, along with the many scenes that remain a part of his childhood experience have formed the basis of much of his work—and continue to do so, even now.

Another subject that is near to his heart, the Native American culture and traditions, also entered his own experience in his youth. Down the road from the farm where he grew up lived an old Souix Indian—more than 100 years old and whose own experiences dated back to the time of Custer—who told Stayton many of the stories that remain vivid in his memory to this day.

Perhaps, his gift for storytelling came partly from his Cherokee grandmother, who also provided insight into the traditions and ceremonies reflected in much of his work. Other insights came from Native Americans with whom he became associated when he began teaching school. These, too, shared their stories and the visions of their ancestors, which Stayton has attempted to capture and preserve in bronze, for the benefit of future generations.

His involvement with longtime pleasures like rodeo and being a jockey, however, came to an abrupt end due to a racing accident that occurred when he was just 17 years old. The accident happened in 1945. He graduated from high school a year later, at which time he decided to pursue the study of art, design and architecture at Montana State.

While in college, he also studied anatomy. In the present, after nearly 25 years of sculpting, Stayton refers to the study of anatomy as an invaluable course—one that has enabled him to create the figures depicted in his art with a much greater degree of detail and accuracy.

Stayton married his wife with a year and a half of college yet to finish. After graduating, he taught art in Fairfield and Sydney, prior to establishing himself in the architectural and commercial design business.

Although his career had not be unrewarding, architectural design still failed to express what was truly within him. Almost thirty years later, with three grown sons who were already established in careers of their own, Stayton decided that it was time to leave the tensions of his present occupation and return to his roots.

Consequently, when he walked away from the architectural design business, in 1980, he did so with every intention of rekindling his early love of representational art and, at the same time, revisiting the scenes that filled his youth with so much wonder and adventure.

Stayton felt compelled to recreate those scenes—and half a century of experiences—with his own hands.

Believing that it had been too long since he had painted, he recalled the little bit of sculpting that he had taken in college. He had enjoyed sculpting then and decided to give it try.

"I wanted to sculpt the things that I knew and what I had observed," Stayton says. "I work from the memories that I have of my life."

Today, he finds sculpting to be so relaxing—and the challenge of capturing the details of his memories in bronze to be so absorbing—that he does it seven days a week, often completely loosing track of time.

He presently produces 10-12 pieces each year, which sell for about $22,000. However, he was able to turn out nine pieces in two months, from the end of August through September. As of October of 2007, he has 22 new pieces in process at the foundry and, to his credit, about 160 finished works.

His images of western life have earned him national recognition. An auction artist at C.M. Russell in 1990, 92, 94, 96 and 98, he was also voted People's Choice of "Best Sculpture" in 1996 for his sculpture of a fly fisherman.

His work is represented at Mary's own Buffalo Trails Gallery, in the Bigfork Station Building on Electric Avenue, where visitors can actually watch him work and gain personal insight into both the art and history of the craft.

A historian and teacher at heart, he instructs others in history and art on a daily basis, as part of his routine, in the hope of instilling an enduring appreciation of both. His personable style and approach to art continue to draw both all types of students.

"I want people to see the historical value of my work," Stayton explains. "All of it is history. That's why I go to the next step and create the stories behind each piece. All of my pieces have meaning, and people are sometimes moved to tears when they read the stories. I try to communicate that history through my work, and I love every bit of it."