A talented recorder of New Mexico landscapes, John Browning captures the golden adobe colors, villages in violet foothills and pearly luminescence of rain veiling the sunlight on the mesa.
Browning began studying art at age fourteen with Harry Anthony. During World War II, he spent three years in the South Pacific, where he was an interpreter among the native tribes for the Army. He also sketched and studied their ancient arts and crafts.
Following this period, he was a trader for eighteen years among the Navajo and Zuni Indians, and many of his landscape paintings reflect travels at that time.
He spent a year in the Joseph Sharp studio in Taos and held classes for students from all over the country. He also spent a season as an art instructor at Daniel Baker College.
Brownwood,Painter, craftsman, photographer,teacher, merchant, farmer.
Browning was born in Oxford, Mississippi ; as a child, he moved to Brownwood with his family. Hewas a student of Harry Anthony De Young and Adele Laure Brunet before attending the art school of the Brooklyn Museum in New York. He painted and taught privately in Brownwood, then worked as a merchant while painting in Arizona and New Mexico. After four years of service in the U.S.Army in the South Pacific during World War II ,Browning lived six years in Gallup, Taos, and SantaFe, before settling once again in Brownwood where he maintained a studio and continued to teach. He served one year as head of the art department at Daniel Baker College. He exhibited locally and at exhibitions sponsored by the Fort Worth Art Association. Indians were a frequent subject in his paintings. Browning died in Brownwood.
Exhibitions: Texas A&M College, College Station(one-man).
Murals: Brownwood Coliseum.
Affiliations: Brownwood Art Association (president 1946-50, Brownwood artist of the year 1983).
