Josey Butler’s vision for equine and equestrian competition art is brought to life by the unique perspective she brings as a competitor in the arena herself. Her artwork began “by accident,” she said, as she has always been creative and interested in art, but her art really blossomed once she felt herself becoming burnt out as a horse trainer, and she turned to painting and sketching as an outlet.
Butler’s art started with watercolor painting and has since broadened into bronze sculptures. Her artwork is created under her brand, Streakin B Art, and is what she calls “competitor-inspired art for the horse lover.” Her art depicts horses as the subject, whether they are pictured mid-buck, driving cattle or competing in the arena. She describes her artistic vision through the lens of shapes and colors but no details. Her artwork is vibrant with emotion and color, and many pieces show abstract figures and streaky details.
Butler’s first big break happened when she was asked to create a commemorative poster for The Mirage’s Rodeo Vegas after-party at the National Finals Rodeo about 10 years ago. Since then, both her media range and prevalence have grown.
“I like sketching and drawing and painting, and I know I see things a little bit differently from your normal Western artist,” Butler said. “But I never really thought it would grow to what it has grown to.”
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Butler’s original piece “Daddy Daughter Date” was painted exclusively for the 2023 WLJ North American Bull Guide and appears on the cover.
Painting and sculpting
For her paintings, Butler uses mostly acrylic ink. About 1 1/2 years ago, Butler began working with oil-based modeling clay, and she has since created five original bronze sculptures, along with three sculptures that were presented as awards at the 2022 National Reined Cowhorse Association (NRCHA) Snaffle Bit Futurity.
She said creating sculptures out of clay comes naturally to her, as her brain sees things in shapes and proportions. The process for sculpting the figures takes about a month. Her first piece, titled “The Professor,” depicts a finished bridle horse, the highest level of training a Western horse can attain. The sculpture sits at about 7.5 inches tall and 5.5 inches wide.
Butler said with a laugh that her preference for painting versus sculpting “depends on which personality she has that day,” but she loves them both. “I can spend more time on a sculpture, but I’m really impatient with the paintings,” she said. “If I have to work on a painting for longer than a day or two, I have to walk away from it and come back, but with the sculptures, it’s kind of like the little kid that sits down in the mud puddle and plays with mud for hours.”
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Butler said her stamp on her art is the emotion put into it. The pieces that come from the heart sell the quickest, she said. “People pick up the emotion from it, and I think that’s what has made it so successful,” she said. “People who appreciate stuff that’s a little different get a feeling from the art.”
Live painting
Butler’s artwork has been created not only in the studio, but also in person in real time at events. In 2022, she created live paintings at five separate events. Most of the events have been charity events, where Butler is commissioned to create a painting in person and the painting is then auctioned off and the money donated to a charity.
“I got to see how much people love to watch you paint, which blows me away because I’m just standing there painting, but they love it and they feel invested in the piece, and then they’ll buy it because they sat there and watched you, and they feel a connection to it,” she said.
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Recently, a couple came up to Butler at an event and asked her to do a live painting at their wedding, just three weeks later. The wedding was held in north Texas and had a mixture of guests present, most of whom were not familiar with the Western lifestyle. Butler painted a man with a guitar riding a bucking horse, to the amazement of the guests. “It’s really neat to watch people enjoy themselves and the painting make them happy,” she said. “I think that is my favorite thing about it. I love the fact that it has turned into a career, but when it makes people happy, that’s even better.”
Butler said when she paints live in front of people, she doesn’t feel added pressure. “I get so engrossed in what I’m doing, I don’t even see people around me,” she said. However, she noted that while she doesn’t mind people watching her paint, she would prefer not to be the one in the spotlight holding the painting when it comes time to auction it off. “I would rather the guys come get it and they get up there,” she said with a laugh. “I don’t need to be up there.”
Inspiration and remembrance
Butler’s inspiration for her pieces comes from the arena and things she sees while she’s competing or riding. She recalls seeing horseman Corey Cushing compete in the NRCHA Snaffle Bit Futurity finals, riding down the fence line after a black animal, and she knew she had to paint it. She painted the scene from above, remembering a bay horse and a black cow but no other details—not even who the rider was. “I just remember the buzzer and the crowd screaming,” she said.
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In a similar occurrence at the 2022 finals, she was inspired to paint a horse in the middle of a lead change, riding away from her. “There wasn’t any great thing that happened there, but where I was sitting was right on the center marker,” she said. “And I kept watching the horses come and make their second lead changes. I watched him change, and I kept seeing the same shape, and it was stuck in my head. So I came home and painted it.” That painting already sold to a fellow NRCHA competitor.
While Butler’s inspiration for her artwork comes from being both in the arena and in the stands, it is clear her fondness and appreciation for the Western lifestyle was instilled in her from a young age from one of her greatest influences, her grandfather. “I used to say he is my John Wayne, but I think John Wayne would’ve looked up to him,” she said.
Butler grew up on a cow-calf operation in Missouri, where she made one of her first memories: riding on her grandfather’s lap in the truck, learning to drive while feeding cattle in the snow. Her grandfather Gailand Johnston passed away in 2021 at 93 years old, but he was a cattleman to the end. “He was what I would consider the last true cattleman,” Butler said. “He was a very strong influence.”
Although a horse accident stopped him from being able to play much more than the guitar, he too was a creative talent, with music being his art of choice. Gailand was also an active reader of Western Livestock Journal and a “hoarder of livestock publications,” Butler said, having saved many issues.
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Butler fondly recalled a story that took place about a year before her grandfather passed away, when her uncle had purchased a brand new Ford F-350 truck. Her uncle received a phone call from the sheriff, asking him if he knew where his dad was, to which Butler’s uncle replied he had left him at the house. The sheriff informed her uncle that he had in fact passed Gailand on the road in her uncle’s brand new truck, on the way to pick up his buddy to drive around on the back roads.
“I get a lot of my bullheadedness from him,” Butler said affectionately.
