Eighteen artists including J. Ottis Adams, John Elwood Bundy, T.C. Steele, and William Forsyth founded the Society of Western Artists. With Adams being one of the founders, the Society of Western Artists was organized in 1896 to unite artists and combine their efforts to drive art forward. Organized in chapters located in St. Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati, and Indianapolis, they frequently came together to showcase art and give awards at one of the chapter’s location. This society allowed for artists in the what was then a remote region of the United States (now the Midwest) to make a living from their passion. It also legitimized artists in the western part of the United States from the perspective of more prominent art centers in eastern states like New York.
J. Ottis Adams was one of the most influential American impressionist painters in the Society of Western Artists, and one of the members of the Indiana Group. His work was showcased all over the Society’s area. He won some notable awards including: bronze medal at the Louisiana Purchase exposition at St. Louis in 1904, $500 from the Society of Western Artists, the Foulke prize at Richmond, IN, and even honorable mention at the Centennial exposition in 1910 at Argentina and Chile. One of his works was showcased in the Panama-Pacific International Exposition, San Francisco, 1915. After many positions, J. Ottis Adams was eventually president of the Society of Western Artists.
