$600

Sallie Bowen

Exhibition: Waterworks Exhibition 2024 Entry Form

Painting Width: 15.25

Painting Height: 18.25

Medium: Watercolor

My husband, a native Montanan, and I enjoy rides in the summer and fall to back country places in southwest Montana, where we live. On one particular ride, we were high in the mountains and came across of herd of cattle. Soon after, we saw two cowboys riding horses just emerging out of the woods and into an open area. The herd dogs, heelers, were in advance. They stopped to talk to us at some length. My husband realized he had known their grandfather and had worked for him on the ranch as a teenager. Only the heelers were anxious to get back to work. They would crouch in the grass and never take their eyes off the herd. They kept giving furtive glances to their owners and to us, “Stop all this wasting time”…they were saying. "We got work to do!”. You will notice that one in the foreground is missing a leg. His owner said he lost it in a farm accident.