Original Painting “Autumn in Vallecitos” [SOLD]

25660-sabo.jpg

+ Add to my watchlist Forward to Friend


Betty Jean Sabo, Southwest Painter
  • Category: Paintings
  • Origin: Western Artists
  • Medium: oil on board
  • Size: 18” x 24” image; 26-3/8” x 32-1/4” framed
  • Item # 25660
  • SOLD

Betty Jean Sabo is one of Albuquerque's most famous contemporary artists. She was a student at some point of Carl Von Hassler, probably in the early years of her career. She was best known as a painter until later in her career at which time she switched to sculpture.  Her paintings are so popular they rarely are sold by those who have them because they know they are irreplaceable.  Unfortunately, it has been a number of years since she painted, so there are no recent ones for collectors to purchase and there will be no more as Sabo is living with Alzheimer’s.

 

She studied art at the University of New Mexico in the late 1940s and was a renowned painter before she began to create the signature bronzes in her mid-60s. The Albuquerque Museum commissioned one of her first sculptures; a 1995 bronze "Julia Resting," of a woman seated on a bench outside the museum's front doors. Julia was the museum’s gift shop manager for decades. Sabo also sculpted the Albuquerque Botanical Garden work featuring Clyde and Carrie Tingley, neighbors of Sabo's when she was a child. Clyde Tingley was an early Governor of New Mexico.

 

Betty Sabo was greatly influenced by Carl Von Hassler.  He was intrigued with traveling around northern New Mexico and painting scenes of small Hispanic-populated villages.  Sabo followed his choice and painted similar themes.  This painting of an autumn scene in Vallecitos, New Mexico, is typical of her work. 

 

Vallecitos is a village in Rio Arriba County, north central New Mexico, about one hour north of Santa Fe and one hour southwest of Taos. It is located in close driving proximity to the world-renowned Ojo Caliente (Hot Springs), Los Alamos National Laboratories, the towns of Española and Taos, the city of Santa Fe, and several small villages. Many scenic areas are also located nearby.  It is a village of adobe houses and cottonwood trees.

 

This painting faithfully documents an adobe house snuggled into a hillside with the traditional mixture of flat-roof and pitch-roof structures.  Cottonwood trees abound in the area.  This is the type location that Sabo savored and most of her paintings are of this style.  Her treatment of the scrub brush in the foreground is amazing.  Each brush is an individual treatment. The typical blue New Mexico sky with white clouds provides a perfect backdrop for the large cottonwood tree on the hill.  Sabo had a unique talent and many Albuquerque residents fortunately recognized such and purchased her paintings while they were available.

 

The painting is signed in lower right Sabo.  It appears to be in the original vintage frame which is in very good condition.

Condition: original condition

 

close up detail view

Betty Jean Sabo, Southwest Painter
  • Category: Paintings
  • Origin: Western Artists
  • Medium: oil on board
  • Size: 18” x 24” image; 26-3/8” x 32-1/4” framed
  • Item # 25660
  • SOLD

25660-sabo.jpg25660-large.jpg Click on image to view larger.