A Mexican Vaquero

A trip to Mexico in 1889 provided Frederic Remington with a wealth of firsthand material for paintings and illustrations created later in his New York studio. Here Remington depicted a vaquero, a Mexican horseman similar to the cowboys of the American frontier. The figure sits astride his horse at an elevated position, his head and torso above the horizon, outlined by the pale blue sky behind him. Portraying the man with a direct gaze and his hand on the reins, Remington suggested that the vaquero was a fixture of the local terrain.

The artist created a version of A Mexican Vaquero as a wood engraving, which appeared in Harper’s Monthly in 1891.

As Oil on canvas (82.6 × 58.4 cm (32 1/2 × 23 in.)), the work shows the tool marks and layering choices typical of Frederic Remington's output in this period — decisions about ground, underpainting, and glaze that a photograph can only partly convey.

Look closely and the painting opens up. Objects you might pass over — a folded letter, a half-drawn curtain, the angle of a glance — were placed to be read. The sitter is constructed: clothes, pose, and attributes were chosen to project status, virtue, and lineage.

Housed at Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago, the painting has passed through the hands of collectors, dealers, and institutions before reaching public view — a provenance that is itself part of the object's story.

“A silence so complete it becomes its own witness.”