Masterpieces in Texas

FORT WORTH, Texas - Winslow Homer's watercolor, "The Woodcutter," Fitz Hugh Lane's "Sunset at Gloucester Harbor" and Georgia O'Keeffe's "Open Clam Shell" and "Closed Clam Shell" can not be viewed at any museum in New York City or Paris. \nThey're in Texas - where they usually aren't on public display at all. \nBut those and nearly 60 other pieces borrowed from private, public and corporate collections across the state are on display through Nov. 17 at the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth. \n"Celebrating America: Masterworks From Texas Collections" features paintings, sculptures, watercolors and photographs by celebrated artists from 1771 to 1969. \n"The caliber of the works is comparable to works in the great collections," said Jane Myers, the museum's chief curator. "And there's a surprise element in that many of the works in private collections weren't widely published or ever published before." \nShe said the museum wanted to showcase works considered masterpieces that also fit with Carter's permanent collection on display. \nMyers said the private collectors - including those who own works by Homer, Lane and O'Keeffe - were gracious in loaning their pieces. Some art owners don't want their names released because of security concerns about the expensive pieces, she said. \nThrough the Carter exhibit, John Singleton Copley's early 1770s oil portraits of Jabez and Sarah Brown Bowen, a wealthy and influential New England couple, have been reunited for the first time in 20 years.\nMyers said she also was surprised that some corporations had such extensive art collections. The Carter exhibit features Helen Corson's 1881 oil painting, "Uncle Ned and His Pupil," loaned by Wells Fargo. \nSBC Communications loaned the early 1900s photograph by Alfred Stieglitz, "The Steerage," showing wealthy ship passengers looking below at immigrants who were being returned to Europe. SBC also loaned O. Winston Link's 1956 photograph of a drive-in theater, "Hot Shot Eastbound, Iaeger, West Virginia." \nBurlington Northern Santa Fe loaned the 1934 pastel drawing "Bullhead" by Winold Reiss, who was commissioned by the Great Northern Railroad Co. to record the Blackfoot Indians of Montana. \nThe exhibit also features works from museums at the University of Texas at Austin and Southwest Texas State University and in Fort Worth, San Antonio, Dallas, El Paso and Albany.