Bill Owen was born in 1942 in Gila Bend, Arizona to a mother who was an artist and a father who had been a cowboy throughout the early 1900s. These influences shaped his desire to be an artist and cultivated his interest in the cowboy lifestyle. Having inherited the God-given talent, it was only natural he would strive to become an artist who chronicles the lives and works of the contemporary cowboy.

Bill has exhibited at the Whitney Museum in Cody, Wyoming, the Grand Palais in Paris, France, and at the Western Art Show in Beijing, China. In 1991 Bill was voted into the National Academy of Western Artists; in 1993 he became a member and staff artist of Rancheros Visitadores and that same year was awarded the Frederic Remington Award for Artistic Merit by the Cowboy Hall of Fame. In 1996 the prestigious Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma honored Bill as their Rendezvous Artist and at the 2003 Prix de West Invitational Exhibition and Sale he became the first recipient of “Express Ranches Great American Cowboy Award.” 

Inducted into the Cowboy Artists of America in 1973, Bill has served as CAA President three times and has earned numerous medals and awards at the annual show.  Two awards that mean the most to Bill are the CAA Award, which he has won four times.  This coveted award is decided by a vote of the active CAA members for the best overall exhibition.  The other is the Traditional Cowboy Arts Association Award for Best Portrayal of a Cowboy Subject.  Bill has won this award twice, and it is decided by a vote of the active TCAA members from the entire CAA exhibition.  

In 1989, while practicing for a rodeo, Bill survived a freak accident which resulted in the loss of sight in his right eye, affecting his depth perception and forcing him to give up sculpting.  He never allowed himself to consider this loss a handicap but greatly missed the medium for thirteen years, successfully resuming sculpting in 2002.

For all of Bill’s artistic achievements, he is especially proud of The Arizona Cowpuncher’s Scholarship Organization, which he founded in 1995 to help finance college educations for young people from Arizona ranching families.

Bill and his wife Valerie live in Kirkland, Arizona.