National Register Listing

Blumenschein, Ernest L., House

Ledoux St., Taos, NM

Ernest L. Blumenschein was a co-founder, in 1898, of the Taos Art Colony, which became the most important art center west of the Mississippi River. The modern art movement in the Southwest was inspired by the "Famous Seven" Taos artists—of whom Blumenschein and Bert G. Phillips were the leaders—who in 1914 formalized their artistic and commercial association in the Taos Society of Artists. Exhibitions by these men, most of whom became National Academicians, spread the artistic attractions of the Southwest across the United States and into Europe. Soon Taos had become the most important art center west of the Mississippi, and the inspiration for other colonies in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Tucson, Arizona. Blumenschein's home, on Ledoux Street in Taos, is an 11-room adobe dating from Spanish times. Even before the Blumenschein family acquired it in 1919, it had been owned by painter Herbert Dunton and had been a gathering point for Taos artists. Now owned by the Kit Carson Memorial Foundation, the house is used as an apartment building.

History

Six of the first artists to come to Taos founded the Taos Society of Artists in 1912. The purpose of the Society was to enable its members to exhibit their paintings as a group in the various galleries throughout the United States. The organizational meeting was held in the home of Dr. Thomas P. Martin, the present location of the Taos Inn. The six charter members, Bert Phillips, Ernest Blumenschein, Oscar E. Berninghaus, Herbert Dunton, Irving Couse, and Joseph Sharp, laid the foundation for the Society and elected Irving Couse as its first president. Other members who later joined the Taos Society of Artists were: Walter Ufer and Victor Higgins, who joined in 1915; E. Martin Hennings in 1921; Catherine Critcher in 1923; and Kenneth Adams in 1926. The Taos Society of Artists proved to be a success from the very beginning. By the time it was dissolved in 1927, several members had acquired considerable national recognition and each member had become financially successful. The effect that the Taos Society of Artists had on Taos itself was far reaching. The enthusiasm and the success of its members became instrumental in bringing other artists to Taos and was a major factor in the establishment of a permanent art colony here. Many tourists began to include Taos on their itineraries just to see for themselves the country that they had seen so vividly portrayed in art shows across the nation. New Mexico was still a Territory in 1883 when Joseph H. Sharp, the first of the group, visited Santa Fe. After a trip in 1893 to Taos, his enthusiasm grew for the area and for the new kind of subject matter he found waiting to be painted. In Paris in 1895, he met Bert Phillips and Ernest Blumenschein, young American painters who were studying there. He told them about northern New Mexico and was so enthusiastic in his description that the two young artists decided to see the area at firsthand when opportunity allowed. While in Denver in the fall of 1898, they decided to go on a sketching trip to Mexico, planning to stop for a look at Taos on their way South. The story of these two artists' first trip to Taos is now a legend. They bought a fragile buggy and two horses in Denver and proceeded south. The two men were new to the ways of the trail, and soon after their start, one of their horses was accidentally strangled. Then when traveling over the rough road near Questa, New Mexico, a wheel on the buggy was broken. They tossed their last coin to determine who should ride to Taos, the nearest settlement having a blacksmith, to have the wheel repaired, and Blumey, as he was called, won the toss and the job. The golden autumn landscape was beautiful, and by the time he had returned with the repaired wheel he had fallen under the spell of the area and had decided to travel no further. Phillips, after a look at Taos himself, stayed to spend the rest of his life in Taos. Taos, at the turn of the century, had its physical drawbacks. Roads into Taos were primitive. First communications were limited to a single telephone line to Taos Junction, 25 miles to the West. There was no electricity or running water. The winters were hard and cold; deep snow was followed by deep mud and leaky roofs were a way of life. There was a new language to learn - Spanish. But the physical hardships did not discourage these artists, who got down to work and produced painting after painting. They were thrilled by the new landscapes and by the Indians available to them as models - a refreshing change after the hackneyed subject matter they had been taught and offered in France and in the Eastern United States. The environment of Taos has a definite effect on the creative effort of those who experience it. There is something about Taos that is creatively stimulating in a way that defies definition, though many persons have tried. D.H. Lawrence called it "the peculiar 'otherness 1 of Taos," which perhaps comes as close anything to describe this effect. This is another factor which has brought and kept artists in Taos through the years. The members of the Taos Society of Artists felt it and were influenced by it, and because of it their paintings found their way to national exhibitions. They began to win recognition and as a result other artists began to flock to Taos. The subject matter - the Indians and the natural beauty of the landscape - struck a responsive chord with the public which was deeply involved at that time with the books of Fenimore Cooper, the Fremont Expedition, the Gold Rush, and a fascination for legendary characters as Kit Carson, Charles Bents, Padre Antonio Jose Martinez, and others. That was the beginning and Taos today boasts of many art galleries and scores of resident artists, writers, musicians, and sculptors. Nine of the eleven members of the Taos Society of Artists lived out their lives in Taos. Today, Kenneth Adams is the surviving member of the Taos Society of Artists and resides in Albuquerque.

Local significance of the building:
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1966.