Pastel Society of the West Coast

by Pamela Comfort

Margaret DeDecker, whose gallery carries Truman’s work says of him, “Bill wears his charm on his lapel” and “his chivalry is omnipresent.” She refers to his paintings as “framed poetry.”

Truman jokes with me that he had to give “Maggie” great sums of money to say that. I find Truman to be an engaging conversationalist, willing to share some of the lesser known background and experiences that have contributed to his great success as an artist and instructor. It’s evident that Truman’s achievement and his art reflect very deliberate and analytical study and preparation, paired with an intense passion and ded-ication to authentic creativity.

Tell us about your upbringing, were there artists in your family or others who inspired you to become an artist when you were young? You grew up in Detroit, correct?

Yes, born at Harper Hospital, which is now part of a big-ger Detroit medical complex, but, my parents first moved to St. Clair Shores, and then moved about a year later. My mother was from a farm in Nebraska and she had an unfortunate thing happen as a young child. Her father and mother wanted to ranch. Her father was very good at training horses, and he had been bringing in train car loads of horses and training them and selling them to the farmers for work. They bought a ranch in Montana. In January of 1919 they sold the farm and all of the livestock and implements, and he, against family advice, got on the train to go to Montana to get the deed to the new ranch and caught the swine flu, that was that big other flu pandemic, and in three days was dead.

So then, my mother and her younger sister, my mother was three at the time, and her younger sister was a new-born—they kind of bounced around the West out there. I think Grandma Mary was trying to find a way to make a living. My mother’s younger sister, when she was three, fell down some stairs at a boarding house and died. At some point, her dad’s brother and his wife brought my mother home to Nebraska, where she spent her forma-tive years. So, she really considered that to be her family. They had a son that she considered to be a brother. After she met my dad, and they married, and they had this newborn baby, which was me, I was the first of three, they found an acre of land just outside of Detroit. My mother built a little garden, a half-acre vegetable garden, and flower gardens, and all these things.

Southwest Art

By Elizabeth L. Delaney

Montana artist Josh Elliott debuts his new exhibition, titled Hush, at Claggett/Rey Gallery in Edwards, Colorado, on Friday, March 6. Hush includes more than a dozen new paintings that demonstrate an intense exploration of the intricate winter landscapes that excite Elliott visually and intellectually.

After extensive travels throughout his home state as well as Idaho, Wyoming, New Mexico and other snowy climates, Elliott has built a reference library of photographs and plein air sketches, many of which informed the pieces in this show. Additionally, he has been inspired by the techniques and processes of other artists working in similar environments, including Scandinavian painters Gustaf Fjæstad and Ferdinand Hodler, Austrian artist Egon Schiele, and Elliott’s father, Steve, the renowned wildlife painter.

The subject matter and materials in Peregrine O’Gormley’s sculptures reflect our world.

Southwest Art

By Bonnie Gangelhoff

In the early 20th century, a cadre of artists associated with the Seattle area created a distinctive regional style that became known as the Northwest School. These artists were influenced by the unique landscape and atmosphere of the Puget Sound area. The natural setting with meandering channels and sprawling skies offered endless inspiration. The movement flourished in the 1930s ad 1940s. Today, a new generation of artists reflect their creative spirit. They are sometimes referred to as a “third-generation of the Northwest School.”

Sculptor Peregrine O’Gormley, who lives in La Conner, Washington, with a home and studio that overlooks the Puget Sound, is part of this new group of artists. The artist is known for his one-of-a-kind, painstakingly carved wood and stone sculptures. His subject matter of choice: the creatures that inhabit the world not far from his front door—falcons, owls, herons, ravens and rabbits—to name a few.

A new exhibition at the Steamboat Art Museum celebrates the work of Robert Lougheed and those he influenced.

Western Art Collector

By John O’Hern

Robert Lougheed (1910-1982) advised, “…the best information is always in front of you,” and often said as he looked at the world around him, “Isn’t it wonderful!” An exclamation rather than a question.

Lougheed’s love of nature and its denizens, his direct experience of it and his ability to portray realistically the “emotional and spiritual qualities” of the experience in his paintings, have inspired two generations of artists of the American West as well as all who have seen his art.

A century after fleeing the U.S. for France, Josephine Baker will be memorialized in bronze by a Loveland sculptor

CPR News

By Ryan Warner

Listen to the Interview

Where does an artist who sculpts history’s most prominent women start?

“The heart is where I begin,” says Loveland sculptor Jane DeDecker. “Sometimes I'll even layer that area so that you can kind of feel and maybe see where the heart lies.”

In a sun-soaked barn perfect for keeping clay warm and malleable, DeDecker is working on a figure who had a lot of heart in real life.

Singer and dancer Josephine Baker was a Renaissance woman. A global superstar. A civil rights activist. A mother to a “rainbow tribe” of 12 adopted children. A spy for the French resistance.

Big Sky Journal | Art 2025

By Melissa Mylchreest

“You know, Josh is just different. He’s not painting things. He’s trying, in his own way, to create poetry,” says Bill Rey, owner of Claggett/Rey Gallery in Edwards, Colorado, who waxes poetic himself when describing the work and philosophy of Montana-based artist Josh Elliott. “In his paintings, the edge of the shadow is where the beauty is, not the shadow itself. It’s the subtleties of water and the perception of wind or of bird life or of virga, the rain falling. He’s looking for the subtle changes, and he’s painting those.”

It’s hard to put a finger on what it is that makes Elliott’s paintings so entrancing, but they are. They depict the beauty of a scene while capturing the feeling it evokes. His work speaks to the senses — the frigid water of a mountain stream, the stultifying heat of the desert at noon, the fresh feel of a sudden downslope wind — in a way that seems almost magical.

Loveland & South Lifestyle

By Adriana Karagozian
Photography by Monica Jean Photography

In a quiet studio in Loveland, Colorado, among the hum of memory and the hush of clay, sculptor Jane DeDecker is shaping more than bronze—she is shaping history. With every curve of metal, every delicate gesture immortalized in form, she tells the untold stories of women. 

“I am a sculptor. I’ve been an artist my whole life,” she says, her voice steady with purpose and humility.

DeDecker’s work is not merely art—it is a calling, a kind of communion with the past and a gift to the present. “My mom instilled in us that art… it’s like an obligation, you know, to your community to be a creative person and to give back.” That sacred sense of duty pulses through every statue she creates.

Covered Bridge | Winter + Spring 2024–25

By Kimberly Nicoletti

Bill and Maggie Rey, owners of Claggett/Rey Gallery, live and breathe art. In addition to representing some of the most renowned artists in North America, they specialize in rare acquisitions and estate-art consultations.

Bill Rey originally partnered with Ray and Sally Duncan, using Sally’s maiden name, Claggett, to start the collaborative gallery in 1989; the Reys fully took over about six years ago, after Ray Duncan passed. Maggie Rey married Bill Rey 25 years ago; they met when he managed her sister’s art career.

The Reys both grew up with parents who appreciated art. Bill Rey stepped into the art world professionally when John and Patti Cogswell offered him a summer job at their gallery in 1983. The summer gig extended into winter and then into another summer as Bill Rey continued to take seminars and art classes.

“It’s a life of art. We never turn it off,” Bill Rey says. “You can never know enough. We’re very involved with a lot of galleries and museum friends. We’re deep in it.”

Western Art & Architecture | August/September 2024

By Todd Wilkinson

What is the true West, and why does our search for an answer matter today?

Will James straddled a fine line between real and imaginary, fact and fiction, the mythological and genuine article. He traversed, as an artistic underdog, the boundary between invention and reinvention, often being on the move to stay ahead of the past.

According to Bill Rey, owner and partner of Claggett/Rey Gallery in Edwards, Colorado, James represented a version of the American West that millions still want to believe in. Earlier generations escaped into James’ world on every page he ever wrote, on matinee screens where his storylines represented an escape, and in every nuanced outline of a horse that inhabited his memory — gestural forms he mastered as well as anyone else, including better-known giants of Western art — because he drew from the heart.

In August at Claggett/Rey Gallery, something of a Will James revival is being staged. Entitled Cowboys North and South, the show — which will be up the entire month — commemorates the 100th anniversary publishing of a James’ book by the same name. Pure and mischievous in its intent, the happening brings together an enigmatic assemblage of fine art created not only by James [1892–1942] but inspired by him. Painters and sculptors past and present, photographers, poets, makers of fine Western jewelry and textiles will all have works represented. At least 100 objects will be in the show. It is Rey’s way of paying homage to what he calls “the unifying presence James had at a crucial time in our country’s history.” That’s not dissimilar, he says, to where we find ourselves now. “I believe art that reminds us of where we’ve been can serve as a compass for reaching the better place we’re heading.”

Western Art Collector | August 2024

By Chadd Scott

The words and images of Will James serve as the inspiration for a new show at Claggett/Rey Gallery.

Will James’ life as a cowboy across the West read like a novel, so, at the encouragement of his wife, he wrote it all down. What started as magazine stories evolved into 24 books between 1924 and 1942. All feature his illustrations. James (1892-1942) was the archetypal cowboy artist.

He did 18 months on a cattle rustling rap in 1914, time he used honing his talent for drawing, a talent expressed as a child growing up in Québec, Canada, under his given name Joseph Ernest Nephtali Dufault. The boy’s fascination with horses and cowboys led him to the western United States where he assumed various aliases—perhaps in evasion of the law—eventually setting on Will James.

A real-life man with no name. A real-life drifter.

Sporting Classics | July/August 2024

By Todd Wilkinson

A trove of works from the estate of painter Robert Lougheed is giving new generations fresh appreciation for his sporting art.

How would you rate your level of knowledge about some of the greatest sporting artists of the past century?

Just for fun, try this test. Mention the name Robert Elmer Lougheed and, in some older social circles, the reference immediately summons heartfelt visions of major oil paintings hanging in prominent museums or works considered essential additions to any reputable private Western art collection.

Indeed, Lougheed (1910-1982) is celebrated as a master painter of horses and as a “cowboy artist” though he never dwelled on a ranch, ran cattle or would be mistaken for a salty wrangler on the fictional TV shows “Gunsmoke” or “Yellowstone.”

The Denver Post | April 29, 2024

By Michelle Ellis

The Colorado Governor’s Art Show & Sale, one of the largest juried fine art shows to exclusively feature Colorado artists, has revealed the 61 Colorado artists selected to participate in the 33rd annual exhibit, plus the 2024 Legacy Artist. From May 11 through June 9, the show and sale will feature an in-person exhibit at the Loveland Museum and both in-person and online fine art sales. 

Vail Valley Magazine | November 21, 2023

By Shauna Farnell

When William Truman Hosner is outside painting, he slips into a subconscious state. He is hypnotized by the work of capturing sunlight as it moves across a building or hillside, on the deepening shades of blue and black across varying depths of a seascape. Working exclusively in pastels, he feels like a child finger painting. But when he’s finished, the scene looks staggeringly real, with shadows stretching under rock formations, reflections twinkling off the surface of water or casting a shimmer onto a wall.

“Most of the time when I come off the field, I can’t tell you what I’ve done for the last three hours,” Hosner said. “But afterward, I look at the painting and say, you know, this one’s not too bad.”

A Detroit native who now splits his time between his home city and Paso Robles, Calif., Hosner started his art career as a commercial illustrator. He created illustrations for major films, car companies and magazines. Having originally gathered his skills through a fine arts program at Wayne State University, he realized one day that his heart’s path was leaning toward painting.

Mercy Newsroom | August 24, 2023

ST. LOUIS  – The life and service of Sister Mary Roch Rocklage will be commemorated in a sculpture to be installed at The Mercy Center for Performance Medicine & Specialty Care, on the campus of Mercy St. Louis, on Thursday, Aug. 24. Colorado artist Jane DeDecker, renowned for her work spotlighting women who made important contributions to history, was commissioned to sculpt Sister Roch, as she was affectionately known by those in the Mercy community and beyond.

As the leader whose vision created Mercy’s integrated health care system, Sister Roch also anticipated the need to transition leadership of the Sisters of Mercy health system to lay leaders, guiding the work over several years. Born Antoinette Marie Rocklage, Sister Roch died in August 2022 after a lengthy illness. She was known for her humble but tenacious leadership style – a blend of compassion, bold innovation and selflessness. Her devotion lives on in the work that continues across Mercy.

Western Art Collector | July 2023

LANDSCAPE PAINTINGS BY LANNY GRANT AND JEWELRY BY BO JOE ARRIVE AT CLAGGETT/REY GALLERY

On July 10, Claggett/Rey Gallery in Edwards, Colorado, will offer a fascinating pairing of artists: oil painter Lanny Grant and jeweler Bo Joe. Together their works will speak to each other as they complement a larger story of the West.

“Claggett/Rey Gallery is excited to host two exciting shows concurrently during the month of July for artists Bo Joe and Lanny Grant. Lanny Grant will unveil his Wilderness Legacy collection focused on his expeditions into preserved alpine destinations of the Colorado and Wyoming mountains,” says gallery owner Margaret DeDecker. “Bo Joe’s exhibit Beauty in the Raw – From Earth to Art combines his artistic passions of interlacing traditional tufa casting techniques with his intuition to reveal the inner beauty of raw gemstones—creating unique wearable works of art.”

Loveland Reporter-Herald

By Austin Fleskes

When the League of Women Voters of Colorado announced a Mother’s Day campaign to recognize statewide modern suffragists, Kathy Wilson, a member of the Larimer County chapter of the league, had one woman in mind to nominate.

“From the first time I heard about the program, the fundraiser for the league, Jane (DeDecker) just came to mind immediately because of the work she has done on the monument, all the research she has done,” she said. “I thought she was the perfect nominee.”

Vail Daily

By Shauna Farnell

At first glance, there’s no obvious similarity between Nancy Switzer and Jane DeDecker or their work. DeDecker sculpts (oftentimes life-sized) human figures and animals out of clay. Switzer paints inanimate objects – cartons, cans, sacks and bottles – on canvas. However, DeDecker says there’s a directness and similar palpable energy to both of their work. Switzer describes their common ground as “ballsy.”

Western Art Collector | March 2023

When visiting Colorado, you simply cannot ignore the monumental and awe-inspiring presence of the many peaks and natural wonders of the Rocky Mountain range or the “Southern Rocky Mountains.” Colorado is home to the highest of the peaks in the entire range that spans around 3,000 miles between Canada and New Mexico. Many creatives, for many years and across generations, have been hypnotized by its allure—compelling them to try their very best to not only capture the indescribable beauty of the Rockies, but a taste of Colorado itself.

Claggett/Rey Gallery is nestled in the heart of the Colorado mountains in the quaint town of Edwards, Colorado. This adorable town is the energized heart of the Vail Valley—surrounded by fabulous restaurants, retail, an arts center and bookstore with convenient parking for patrons.

American Art Collector | March 2023

TWO COLORADO ARTISTS EXPLORE GESTURE AND FLOW IN EVERYDAY SCENES

By Meg Daly

As winter’s grip begins to loosen in the Rocky Mountains, a show of new works by Colorado artists Jane DeDecker and Nancy Switzer harkens the energy and light of early spring.

The Aspen Times

By Josie Taris

The Basalt River Park will soon be home to new public-art installations meant to capture the spirit town. 

The Basalt Town Council approved an agreement for professional services Tuesday to contract local artist Gail Folwell to create and install her “Stay Human” project in Basalt. 

The project comprises bronze sculptures ranging in height from 5 to 6’8” tall and mounted on steel poles, depicting people in movement. The sculptures are designed to spin, either by wind or hand. 

Sara Nadolny is a senior planner with the town, and she helped lead the search for an artist to contribute to Basalt River Park.