From vibrant tipis to courageous cowgirls, Nancy captures the strength and beauty of the American West.

Nancy Dunlop Cawdrey lives in a world of color. And she likes to paint that way as well. Growing up quite literally around the world, Cawdrey found early inspiration in patterns and colors from places she has lived as a child and teenager, ranging anywhere from Syria to Germany. Studying studio art in Paris for two years as a college student, Nancy became attuned to Old Master techniques and found her voice through painting. After living for some years abroad in England and Europe with her husband Steve, eventually they found themselves returning to the United States and settling down in Montana.

Nancy discovered the medium of silk painting also on her travels, this time, in Hawaii. The propensity for vibrancy in the dyes and the looseness of the technique, close to the techniques of watercolor, captured Nancy. While a fairly novel medium, combining the subject matter of the west and the ancient art of silk painting, she has created a portfolio and style of painting that is wholly unique to her studio.

In Northwestern Montana, glacial streams seep from the craggy peaks of Glacier, spiraling through great wide plains of Eastern Montana and the Dakotas, and eventually spill out into both the Pacific Ocean and the Missouri River. With these waters carving out the dramatic landscape of the Northern Rockies, Montana is a muse to any artist. Nancy finds inspiration from everywhere in the landscape. Bright red poppies and native flora fill her canvases just as much as wilder characters such as bears, moose, and mountain goats. Her silk paintings have become just as much of a fixture of the American Western.

In 2020, Nancy was honored to launch a one-woman traveling museum exhibit titled “Forever Glacier” which focuses on the mammals native to Glacier National Park. The collection contains twenty-five large-format original silk paintings depicting Glacier’s variety of mammals, habitats, and landscapes. The exhibit’s inaugural show was hosted by the C.M. Russell Museum and later traveled to the prestigious Booth Western Art Museum.

Nancy also teaches silk painting workshops multiple times a year. Since around 2010, she has led a workshop at Triple Creek Ranch in Darby, MT, a five-star resort and member of the prestigious Relais & Châteaux.

Nancy is a founding member of the Russell Skull Society of Artists and has regularly participated in The Russell: A Sale to Benefit the C.M. Russell Museum. She has shown at the National Cowboy Museum’s Small Works, Great Wonders show, the National Cowgirl Museum, the Gilcrease Museum, and various other shows across the country. In 2010, her art was selected to be an Official Glacier Park Centennial Art piece and Nancy became an Official Centennial Artist chosen by the Glacier National Park 2010 Centennial Committee. Honors include being the Featured Artist at the Jackson Hole Fall Arts Festival 30th Anniversary where Nancy’s painting set a new auction record, and numerous years as “People’s Choice” at the Buffalo Bill Art Show & Sale in Cody, Wyoming. Nancy’s work is included in the stellar “Night of Artists” show at the Briscoe Western Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas.

Nancy is represented by Cawdrey Gallery in Whitefish, Montana; West Lives On Contemporary Gallery in Jackson Hole, Wyoming; Big Horn Galleries in Cody, Wyoming and Tubac, Arizona; and the San Francisco Street Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico.