Martin Hagen

I was born and raised in Jackson Hole, Wyoming to Grant O., and Margaret E. Hagen in 1954 and, except for a brief time in Montana, have maintained Jackson as my residence. My parents were very involved in both the cultural and wilderness aspects of living in this part of Wyoming and this gave me an early awareness of and appreciation for the arts and wild lands.
As a past athlete for the U.S. Biathlon team and an avid outdoor sports enthusiast, I have experienced many different types of sports. Through my athletic career, which includes nine World Championships and three Olympic games, I have gained an intimate knowledge of physiology, biomechanics, and anatomy.
My father’s influence as a very accomplished wildlife artist in a wide range of mediums motivated me to try my hand as a sculptor. Through his teaching at the Teton Artist’s Association, which he and fellow artists Paul Bransom and Conrad Schwering founded, he shared a philosophy with his students that has remained with me ever since. He would say, “To paint a horse in the corral you need to know what’s underneath the hide to make it a horse. Otherwise you may as well throw the hide over the fence and paint that.” My passion for athletic competition became an easy topic to test my talents in the arts and I found myself flooded with more ideas than I could easily put into clay, because, I know what is underneath the hide.
As time has passed, I’ve expanded into wildlife subjects as well in part because of my father’s influence, but mostly because of the beauty and grace they exhibit in their natural setting. Because of my love of wild country, both the human and wildlife subjects that I do have a common thread that binds them together as it is in nature.