There was a time early in Curtis Zabel’s career when he feared he might someday be forced to choose between his two lifelong passions—ranching and art. But the two have become so intertwined over the years, his worries eventually evaporated with the unmitigated success of both.

Zabel’s historic ranch, along Elk River bottomland in the lush Yampa Valley of northwestern Colorado, is so picturesque, it has appeared in numerous paintings and has served as the site of workshops by well-know artists such as Clyde Aspevig, Joe Bohler, Bill Reese, Ned Jacob, Ramon Kelly and Lowell Smith. But it is the authenticity of Zabel’s own bronze sculpture that has earned him numerous awards and enthusiastic following among connoisseurs of Western art.

Born in Athol, Kansas, Zabel moved to Routt County when he was two years old, and grew up around work-teams, cattle, horses and abundant wildlife in the surrounding mountains. He was a prolific artist from earliest childhood, and a prize-winning painter by the time he graduated from high school in Hayden. He was gaining stature as a painter when a friend sent him some beeswax to sculpt with, and Zabel immediately became hooked. His first bronze of a cowboy on a horse sold out the edition of ten in two weeks, much to the artist’s amazement, and set a precedence for many of his editions over the next twenty years.

Zabel’s discovery of this tactile new medium allowed him so much greater expression in translating his life into art, he embraced with an enthusiasm that remains undimmed today. Initially, ranching supported his art and his family. But now, with sons Ty and Kirk grown and with families of their own, Zabel and his wife Shirley find the art business dominates. They have downsized their herd of Texas longhorns to five “pets,” as they fondly refer to them, and leased out some of their pasture. Nonetheless, each winter morning, Zabel still hitches up his work-team to feed his cattle and horses. And although he finds winters in the Yampa Valley to be long and cold, it also is the ideal time to get a lot of work done inside the warmth of his contemporary studio adjacent to the house.

When Zabel talks about his longhorns, his admiration for the breed is obvious: “I like the longhorn for the same reason a person likes to buy Western art—it’s part of our Western heritage that is disappearing.” But perhaps his greatest love is for horses, of which he still keeps ten. “I like a muscled horse,” he says with a smile, pointing out detail in the flank and legs of a nearby sculpture. Knowledge of his subject matter—from wildlife to horses, to cattle to working cowboys—is so thorough, Zabel translates it into subtle and sometimes humorous detail.

In addition to his considerable talents, Zabel’s soft spoken friendliness and genuine modesty are widely admired in his circle of artists, collectors and friends. For the last several years, Zabel has ridden with the Round-Up Riders of the Rockies, a group of professionals from all over the country who gather in Colorado for a week long ride each July, inviting a sharing and camaraderie that Zabel finds most satisfying.

In his art, Zabel strives to be a perfectionist. “I know how a saddle is made, and if you’re going to do a saddle, I think it’s very important for it to be right. I want my sculpture to look alive, to be convincing in its movement. And I like to put in bits of humor, which I find even in the sad parts of life.”

There is an urgency to Zabel’s passion for his subject matter, a growing realization that with the double threat of development and rising costs of running a ranch, his may indeed be a vanishing lifestyle, a way of life soon to pass as surely as that of the 19th century cowboy. But what is certain in Zabel’s mind is that it won’t be forgotten, the truth of the ranching life as he has lived it captured convincingly in bronze.