July 10, 2024
Shermalee & Lou Mack: A Retrospective
Exhibit opens Friday, July 26
The Frontier Times Museum is celebrating the National Day of the American Cowboy with the opening of Capturing the Old West in Bronze, a retrospective exhibit on sculptors Shermalee and Lou Mack. Basically self-taught with some limited training, Shermalee created bronzes of Old West characters and vignettes that captured the dynamic history and movement of the Old West. Her husband Lou assisted with the casting of her bronzes and was soon creating his own sculptures.
Shemalee was the daughter of a pioneer aviator and grew up spending time with her father and other characters around airplane hangars and in saddle shops or stockyards near the cow and horse barns. Living in Texas, Colorado and Arizona, she was captivated by the culture and art of the American Indians, as well as stories of Old West outlaws. She met her husband Lou, a native of South Dakota, who is part Sioux Indian in Arizona.
The images of her youth became the inspiration for the wax figures she carved at her kitchen table before casting them in bronze. Together, Shermalee and Lou created the Mack Cowboy collection of bronze sculptures that have been exhibited throughout Texas and the United States.
Moving to Bandera, the Macks opened the Skyline Ranch RV Park, but continued to pursue their art and capturing their abiding love of the American West in the subject matter of their bronzes – the Plains Indian, the Mountaineer, the Cowboy, the Outlaw and the Gambler. The exhibit will feature an exciting selection of their bronzes and will include rare examples of Shermalee’s early works in paper mache.
The exhibit will open Friday, July 26, in the museum’s Doane Western Art Gallery from 5:30 - 8 p.m., and is free and open to the public. Wine and refreshments will be served. The museum would like to thank Shermalee and Lou’s children for generously lending their bronzes, and for working with the museum to honor their late parents with this very special retrospective.
Shemalee was the daughter of a pioneer aviator and grew up spending time with her father and other characters around airplane hangars and in saddle shops or stockyards near the cow and horse barns. Living in Texas, Colorado and Arizona, she was captivated by the culture and art of the American Indians, as well as stories of Old West outlaws. She met her husband Lou, a native of South Dakota, who is part Sioux Indian in Arizona.
The images of her youth became the inspiration for the wax figures she carved at her kitchen table before casting them in bronze. Together, Shermalee and Lou created the Mack Cowboy collection of bronze sculptures that have been exhibited throughout Texas and the United States.
Moving to Bandera, the Macks opened the Skyline Ranch RV Park, but continued to pursue their art and capturing their abiding love of the American West in the subject matter of their bronzes – the Plains Indian, the Mountaineer, the Cowboy, the Outlaw and the Gambler. The exhibit will feature an exciting selection of their bronzes and will include rare examples of Shermalee’s early works in paper mache.
The exhibit will open Friday, July 26, in the museum’s Doane Western Art Gallery from 5:30 - 8 p.m., and is free and open to the public. Wine and refreshments will be served. The museum would like to thank Shermalee and Lou’s children for generously lending their bronzes, and for working with the museum to honor their late parents with this very special retrospective.