Luis Ortega (1897-1995), winner of a National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and numerous other awards, is widely regarded as one of the great masters (if not the great master) of the art of rawhide braiding in the United States. He was also an author and widely recognized authority on the horsemanship traditions of Spanish California. This volume was published in conjunction with the permanent Luis Ortega exhibit at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum (NCWHM) in Oklahoma City. It is not an exhibit catalog in the traditional sense, although it is illustrated with numerous photos of Ortega’s work, but rather “a comprehensive overview of the life, art and career” of Ortega. The co-authors are a well-known western saddlemaker (Chuck Stormes) and a curator at the NCWHM (Don Reeves). The book is well written, attractive, and informative but not academic; the audience seems to be rawhide braiders and collectors (as stated in the forward) and, more broadly, those interested in the ranch culture of the western United States.
The book is arranged chronologically, combining genealogy and biography with a study of Ortega’s influences, techniques, aesthetics, and innovations as a craftsman. Ortega was proud of his descent from an early, prominent Spanish Californian family, and saw himself as continuing the Californio traditions of horsemanship from his family and culture. The first chapter, therefore, explores Ortega family history and includes a brief description of the ranch culture of Spanish California, beginning in the eighteenth century, with an emphasis on the traditions in which Luis Ortega participated, including rawhide braiding. The next two chapters give Ortega’s life story from his birth in 1897 through the early 1940s. As the son of a vaquero, Ortega grew up doing ranch work, much of it involving horses. From the age of twelve, Ortega learned rawhide braiding from Fernando Librado, a Chumash Indian reportedly born in 1804, who had learned the craft on mission ranches when California was part of Nueva España. During his youth, Ortega worked as a buckaroo and braided part time. In the 1930s, Ortega’s friend, the “cowboy artist” Edward Borein, persuaded Ortega to braid full time and to market his work as art. Ortega began to sell his work to affluent clients, and to advertise in magazines. By the late 1930s, Ortega was married and had developed braiding into a thriving business. From about 1940 to 1955, with the assistance of his wife, Rose, Ortega published two books and a series of articles about Spanish California horsemanship; these publications are still considered to be essential texts on the subject.
The meat of this book details Ortega’s development as an artist. Ortega’s work always consisted of utilitarian horse gear including reatas, hackamores, reins, hobbles, and quirts; the production of any objects that weren’t fully functional and durable occupational equipment would have been a violation of the rawhide braiders’ aesthetic. By the 1930s, braided rawhide tack was beginning to be replaced by linen ropes and other mass-produced or less labor-intensive tack. Like western saddles and many other traditional crafts, rawhide braiding was able to survive and thrive by moving into art and collectors markets; Ortega led the way for this transformation in the craft of rawhide braiding. His work became finer, more ornate, and more complex, moving from eight strands of rawhide to twelve strands to sixteen strands, and to increasingly intricate weaving patterns and knots. He also increasingly used dyes to make complex and striking color patterns that complemented the patterns of the weaving. Late in his career, he “defied practicality” by producing miniature tack made from minutely fine strands of rawhide.
Like other masters of traditional art forms, Ortega was both an authority on the traditions of his craft and an innovator. Ortega innovated in all phases of his craft: he created his own ways of making fine, beveled strands of rawhide, of dyeing, of braiding, of interweaving color, and of marketing. Ortega had a reputation for being secretive about his craft techniques, but he was willing at times to share them with experienced braiders who demonstrated their dedication. His work for affluent patrons occasionally brought criticisms that he had left his community behind and become an “elitist,” but there is no question that, by moving rawhide braiding into art markets, he helped to preserve the craft, although he also transformed it. His association with institutions such as the NCWHM brought him into a western regional art world in which his work was displayed alongside painting by Frederic Remington or Charles Russell, beaded Plains Indian moccasins, or Don King saddles. Other braiders have been able to follow him into this world.
The literature on cowboy crafts consists primarily of how-to books and coffee table books. Scholarly works have been mostly on saddles, bits, or spurs. Stormes and Reeves have produced the first scholarly book on rawhide braiding. Although it could have used more analysis of Ortega’s technical innovations, his aesthetic ideas and styles, and his relationships with markets and patrons, both the text and the photos do justice to Luis Ortega’s art. This book is recommended to anyone interested in cowboy crafts, in the ranch culture of the western United States, or in the transformation of traditional crafts as they adapt to art and collectors markets.
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[Review length: 878 words • Review posted on August 13, 2010]