This biography from the Archives of AskART:
|  Born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, Bill Anton became a western painter, especially of the lifestyle of cowboys. He first traveled West at age seven. He attended Loyola University in Chicago and then transferred to Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona, majoring in English. He settled in Arizona, and his wife, Peggy, supported him while he established his career as an artist.
He was inspired with western painting when he attended a Cowboy Artist of American Exhibition in the late 1970s at the Phoenix Art Museum. In 1982, he turned to art full time, and visiting ranches in Flagstaff and Prescott, he rode in roundups and learned to work with cattle. He also developed a love of plein-air painting and was much inspired by the work of Anders Zorn, Edgar Payne and Frank Tenney Johnson.
Source:
"Prix de West" 2003 catalogue
Anton attended the Scottsdale Artists' School and succeeded painting cowboy genre paintings. |
Biography from Altermann Galleries and Auctioneers, I:
| After seeing the American west for the first time as a seven year old, Bill Anton vowed to return for good someday. He left his home in the Midwest some 12 years later and the Arizona high country has been home ever since. Exposed to art early and often, Anton drew constantly from the time he was old enough to hold a pencil. Inevitably, his two great loves in life united when he turned to western art full time in 1982.
Visiting ranches around Flagstaff and Prescott, he began to ride roundups, brand calves, and helped pregnancy test, vaccinate, and ship cows. Local ranchers began calling him when they were short handed, although Anton never counted himself good enough to be called “a cowboy,” he says.
After several years of making a living as an artist, he began getting national exposure, but wasn’t satisfied with the progress of his work. Through the influence of some of the country’s best painters, he realized painting outside from life was the only way he would see the artistic growth he wanted. And the passion and spontaneity needed for plein air painting began to help him solve problems in the studio as well. Drawn to the work of Zorn, Sorolla, Payne, and Frank Tenney Johnson, Anton works from field studies whenever possible to achieve the vitality photos cannot match.
Anton’s paintings reflect his fascination with the cowboy lifestyle. In an interview in Art of the West, he said, “The cowboy is connected with the land, like a ponderosa pine. He is unassuming, but he can do anything. He is amazing. A painting all starts with my own reverence and excitement with that person on horseback. I never get tired of the nobility of a man on horseback.”
Resource: Prix de West, 2002 Invitational Exhibition Catalog
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Biography from Debbie Leeuw Fine Art:
| | Bill Anton paints and draws today's working cowboy. Drawn to the work of Anders Zorn, Sorolla, Edgar Payne and Frank Tenney Johnson, Bill works from field studies whenever possible to achieve the vitality photos cannot match. Working primarily in oil, he can always be found in one of three places - the studio, a ranch or painting outdoors.Bill Anton's work is collected privately here and abroad. Corporate collections including he work are Sears, Dupon, State Farm Insurance, Bank of America, Hewlett Packard and Trust Company of the West. |
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