Dawson-Watson, Dawson 1864-1939
Dawson Dawson-Watson's connection to the West began in St. Louis, where he served as the art director of a pageant in Brandesville Missouri, putting him in contact with wealthy Texans who would eventually persuade him to move to San Antonio. Spurred on by his success in the Edgar B. Davis National Competition, whose $5,000 prize (the largest in the nation at the time) he won three years running, Dawson-Watson branched out in his subject matter and began painting numerous canvases of desert flora, mostly cacti. Cacti led to landscapes and landscapes, eventually, brought him to the Grand Canyon, the subject of many of his best late works.