Dan Wingren was an artist and teacher active in Texas, beginning in the 1940s when he was a student at SMU. After graduate school at the University of Iowa, he came back to Texas where he accepted art-related appointments in Austin and San Antonio before returning to Dallas in the 1960s. Primarily known as a painter, Wingren was both a popular and admired professor of art at SMU, where he taught several subjects including 19th- and 20th-century art history, contemporary art, design, drawing and painting.