Lyndle Dunn Collection

The Lyndle Dunn Collection on display on the first and second floors of the E. Y. Berry Library-Learning Center. Artworks off-display can be viewed by request in Case Library (Room 015).

Artist Lyndle Dunn was nationally known for his wildlife portraits. He was born February 26, 1908, and spent his childhood in rural Wyoming where his father was a forest ranger. He began drawing forest animals at a very early age. While attending college, he decided to pursue specialized art training and went on to study at the Chicago Art Institute and the American Art Academy in Chicago.

While still in school he sold many animal paintings through Abercrombie and Fitch in Chicago. After World War II, he moved to Denver, Colorado, where he painted on commission and free-lanced. A large number of his animal portraits were purchased by the State of Colorado to hang in the State Game and Fish Department offices. He sold widely to private collectors and was published extensively in the United States and in Europe. He was known for his exacting attention to detail resulting in realistically capturing his subjects. He would count the rays on the dorsal fins of a trout or the number of primary feathers on a bird.

Dunn moved to the Black Hills in order to do the things that he enjoyed most: painting, hunting, and fishing. “This is one of the few places where a man can go out in the woods to hunt, fish or paint, stay all day, and not see another human being.” He was born February 26, 1908, and died June 6, 1967, in his beloved studio. His ashes are scattered at his favorite fishing spot, Kelly Gulch on Rapid Creek.