Brother Cletus Behlmann (San Antonio, Texas, 1933-2016), Mission Espada, San Antonio, Texas, watercolor on paper

sight: height 19.5 in x width 13.5 in. frame: height 28.5 in. x width 22.5 in.

Provenance: the collection of Joe and Jane Edwards, San Antonio, Texas

In the summer of 1960, Brother Cletus and Brother Mel Meyer - another notable Marianist artist who passed away in 2013 - honed their craft with other young art aspirants in a tent in Chaminade Field on the St. Mary's campus. Behlmann later studied at the Chicago Institute of Art and Washington University in St. Louis. He taught for 19 years at St. Joseph School in Victoria, St. Joseph School in El Paso, and Maryhurst School/St. John Vianney High School near St. Louis. It was there he turned a chicken house into the Rooster Gallery to help educate Vianney art students, which he did until moving to San Antonio in 1977. Shortly thereafter, he opened the St. Mary's University Art Center. He produced art in metal, acrylics, watercolor, batik, pastels, stained glass, ceramics, handmade paper, linoleum prints, crayon and other media. He's been called "shockingly productive" and his ubiquitous works around the city stand as evidence.