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Jo Mora (1876–1947) lived the Western life he depicted in his prolific body of visual art, comprising sculpture, paintings, architectural adornments, dioramas, and maps. He explored California Missions, the natural glories of Yosemite, California’s ranch life, and eventually the culture of the Hopi and Navajo in Arizona. During his travels, Mora documented observations that became the source material and inspiration for much of his later artwork.
Remarkably, throughout his life Mora supported his family solely through a series of art commissions that ranged from restaurant murals to heroic-scale sculpture. He welcomed risks and challenges, was unafraid of hard work, and did nearly everything well, from writing children’s stories to commanding an army battalion-in-training to shooting mountain lions. Ever modest, he seemed to think that this versatility was nothing extraordinary.
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