Forrest Clemenger Bess was an abstract artist, teacher, and framemaker. Most of his works emanated from visions seen in his dreams and recorded into a bedside log. His oil paintings were small and depicted personal symbolic images including eyes, lines, crosses, crescents, and other simple geometric forms.

Forrest Bess was born in 1911 in Bay City, Texas. As a youngster, he spent time in various oil towns in Oklahoma and Texas, as his father was an itinerant oil worker. Bess' grandmother likely provided his interest in art. His first art lessons were given to him by a neighbor in 1924.

He studied architecture in 1929 at what is now Texan A&M University, and his other intellectual interests included Greek mythology, English li...