cover image Victor Higgins: An American Master

Victor Higgins: An American Master

Dean A. Porter. Peregrine Smith Books, $65 (304pp) ISBN 978-0-87905-362-8

Victor Higgins's intensely lit paintings of Taos, N.M., capture the area's austere beauty as well as the self-reliance, dignity and age-old traditions of the Native Americans. Although he was a cerebral artist who painted in a three-piece suit, Higgins (1884-1949) created works whose integrity and purity arguably place them with the best of George Bellows, John Sloan, Reginald Marsh and Georgia O'Keeffe. His strong, semi-mystical landscapes, from which human figures are usually absent, seem like transcendent revelations. Cubist-influenced watercolors of storms and mountains are reminiscent of John Marin. Higgins's Aspens series has a universal appeal, and the ``Little Gems'' of the 1940s--jewel-like oils of pueblo towns and sprawling mountains--make every brush stroke count. Director of the Snite Museum of Art at the University of Notre Dame, Porter writes with authority and verve in this breathtakingly illustrated study, which accompanies a traveling exhibition. (June)