Hill Country Artist: Dane Winslow Ellsworth – Can You Feel It?

Dane Winslow Ellsworth started his art career as a young child, on a billboard scaffold helping his father paint them the old-fashioned way – on site, by hand, with paint. They painted signs, storefront windows, billboards, and whatever else needed a talented artist with a brush and a stock of paint. They traveled from one coast to the other, but Dane eventually settled on the Texas Hill Country as his home. “I had never been here before but it was a little like coming home. Between the culture and the landscape, I knew I could paint for a thousand years and never run out of inspiration.” The full title of the featured image above is “Can you feel it? That’s the toil, sweat, and blood of patriots.”

Hill Country landscapes are Dane’s favorite subject.

Photo: Dane Winslow Ellsworth

Dane travels the back roads looking for inspiration. He takes part of one scene and part of another and pieces it together in his mind to create the beauty familiar to all who know the Texas Hill Country. “We place a lot of value on great views. In many of my paintings, my goal is to create depth and draw the viewer into the distance. To me, the horizon is beautifully mysterious because it’s always out there and a bit of a metaphor for life. Like an athlete who continuously strives to perform better, and no matter how good he or she gets, the goal is always out there.”

Dane knows how to cowboy.

Photo: Dane Winslow Ellsworth

Dane tells the story, “Just a few years back when I was still a young buck I worked on a ranch in Oklahoma. The half owner and foreman of the place was old school and a superb horseman. I remember one day as we were about to saddle up I was bragging on how well I was doing at breaking one of the colts and how much I enjoyed it. When I finally shut up, he remarked back, ‘Yep it can be quite the habit. Any good cowboy worth his salt will tell you that if it can’t be done from the back of a horse, it can probably wait. Uh son, would you step back in the barn there and grab the post hole diggers.'”

West Texas Gothic