I first learned of Boyd Perry and his art in 1968-69 when I was working in Arlington TX. I was at an art show and saw a Boyd Perry carving of Arlington Mayor Tom Vandergriff and was highly impressed.
I subsequently met Boyd at a bird identification class that we both took in Arlington TX to help us learn how to identify the birds that we wanted to incorporate into our art. Boyd wanted to do carvings and I wanted to do oil paintings of birds. Boyd and I would drive around the countryside to observe the birds that we wanted to carve/paint and occasionally would shoot some birds to bring back for use as models. We would also go to the natural history museum to study birds. It was during this time that I created a set of eight bird paintings that were made into prints by SRI Publishing in Fort Worth TX in 1970.
Boyd was strongly influenced by renowned woodcarver Gene Zesch. He had been doing western caricatures before we met. He did wildlife for a while but eventually went back to western caricatures which was what he really wanted to do. Boyd's carving medium had been wood but I introduced him to "sculpey" which was much easier to work with and achieve greater detail. He worked with “sculpey” for a while but eventually went back to wood carving.
Boyd helped me with a number of the sculptures that I created for casting as figurines when things really got busy with Border Fine Arts and I was being pushed to produce more pieces. This included the Route 66 series. Boyd also helped me with some of the pieces that I did for ERTL. Boyd would come up to Red Oak II for several months at a time to work.
The Carthage Press did an article about Boyd Perry in November 1981 when he was at Red Oak II working with me Transplanted Artist Draws Highest Praise from Davis.
In 1989 Boyd and I attended a Halloween party. Boyd dressed as a scarecrow.
and I did the following painting of him.
I always felt that Boyd and I were like brothers.
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