This weekend I gave a presentation on San Antonio Artist Mary Anita Bonner to the annual meeting of CASETA held at the Witte Museum. Bonner, a native of Louisiana, moved to San Antonio with her family as a young woman but experienced her first successes in Paris, France where she studied etching as her major artistic form of expression. Bonner split her time as an artist between France and San Antonio during much of the 1920s before returning to the Alamo City, living there for almost a decade before her death. Much of her work, especially her etchings on Texas subjects, manifested a unique style and a singular form of expression which even today make them immediately identifiable, even by someone without artistic training or possessing an experienced eye for understanding art. This was the case for two reasons. First, many of her best-known works centered on Texas ranch life, especially focused on cowboys. This became the subject matter which dominated her most enduring art. Second, her style of expression rested on an angular presentation of one-dimensional representation which evoked a curious blend of block printing coupled to a sophisticated “cartoonish” panache which brought both humor and pathos to her subjects. Today, retrospectively three generations after her passing, Bonner’s reputation has considerably dimmed in San Antonio except for those aware of the city’s artistic heritage. Nonetheless, for those aware individuals familiar with the development of the visual arts not only in the Alamo City, but all across the Lone State, Mary Bonner’s star still shines vibrantly in the pantheon of women who have made contributions to Texas art.
Mary Anita Bonner
