Rick Bartow

Egypt Two

Immediately after earning his degree in art education from Western Oregon State College in the 1960s, artist Rick Bartow (Wiyot) was drafted into the Vietnam War. Upon returning home, the artist was tormented by post-traumatic stress disorder, which led to a battle with alcoholism. In this period, Bartow began to focus on his art practice, turning to drawing as a form of therapy. His art explores the concept of transformation—often self-reflectively, sometimes in the form of abstract portraiture. While colorful, his drawings and paintings have a serious tone to them. Their erratic marks appear chaotic, and at times violent. Many of Bartow’s works, including Egypt Two, feature a crow. Bartow believed that birds appear at important moments in life, carrying messages and signaling impending change. He frequently drew upon Indigenous, Greek, and Egyptian symbolism and mythologies to create animal-human hybrid figures, such as the half-crow, half-man figure in Egypt Two.