Artist Spotlight

August 28

Woodrow Blagg

William Campbell Gallery is pleased to spotlight the work of the late Woodrow Blagg (1946-2023). Today, the gallery continues to offer Blagg’s original drawings, limited edition prints, and lithography. 

Woody Blagg was best known for his large-scale, hyper-realistic graphite drawings depicting cowboy culture. Mr. Blagg was also an accomplished photographer and inspired his younger brothers, Daniel, Dennis, and Doug to pursue the arts. 

Woodrow Blagg was born on November 19, 1946 in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania. He attended the Dallas Art Institute and later the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (PAFA) in Philadelphia. Artistically, he was influenced by painter and illustrator N.C. Wyeth and son, the painter Andrew Wyeth, who served on the board of PAFA during the time Mr. Blagg was enrolled.

Though Mr. Blagg spent years in Pennsylvania, he was enamored with traveling and being in nature. He spent time exploring Europe, Maine, and Canada before returning to Texas. During a 1979 visit to the W. T. Waggoner Ranch with his brother, Jim, Blagg was enchanted by the landscape, the animals, and the community, which sparked an ongoing interest in depicting life on the ranch.

Mr. Blagg returned to the ranch often to take photographs and engage in ranch work. Through his time there he developed friendships and gathered images and experiences that would continue to shape his art, both in the content he produced and in the way he worked. Blagg explained, “I would go back to the studio and start a four- or five-foot drawing, but that didn’t work. I just kept adding pieces of paper on the end of what I’d been completing, and three weeks later, I had a rough sketch that was twenty-one feet long. I found that scale worked. It connected to the experience that I had.”

Over the decades, Mr. Blagg’s work has been exhibited at venues across Texas and the United States. In 1982 he was invited to the White House, where he presented President Ronald Reagan with a large drawing depicting ranch life. Mr. Blagg’s work is also in corporate and private collections, including a piece which is on view at the Ralph Lauren corporate office in New York.

WCG is pleased to present collections of limited edition prints on paper, original work, and lithography.

Please stop by 4935 Byers Avenue, Fort Worth, to view his work.