Evening Light over Utah

Desert Sunset Study 1

8" x 10" oil on canvas

 

Last night, after I closed the gallery, I drove to the high desert north of Moab and painted a couple sky studies. The quality of light in the evening sky is just as varied and stunning as the atmosphere that falls against the Navajo sandstone. At this location looking west across the Utah desert, on a clear day I can see 80-100 miles. This long-distance view only accentuates the cloud-sky colors and patterns. After painting I drove to the Monitor and Merrimac Buttes to watch the last purples fade from the spring sky.  

Desert Sunset Study 2

8"x 8" oil on canvas

Best Plein Air Day Ever......so far

Today was some of the best plein air painting that I've experienced since arriving in Moab. The day started at the Red Rock Bakery of course with the owner, Howard, pouring coffee and talking Utah politics with the tourists.....always worth listening in.
Next, I'm making arrangements with my friend Phil Wagner; oil painter, poet and renaissance man, to paint in Arches National Park at 10 A.M. When I finally arrive this is what I see on the side of the road (photo to the left). Phil has framed and attached make-shift wooden legs to a 32" x 40" piece of plywood, constructing a tabletop-like paint surface for his newest (and largest) plein air painting. Looking very-much like a giant robot spider, I'm waiting for it to start walking around at anytime now.
Phil paints a bright base coat of yellow paint which immediately gets the visitors attention and the cars start pulling over.

This is exactly why I love working with Phil; he is always experimenting with something new. He is either studying dead painters, fiddling with art chemicals or stretching the limits of whats possibly in the field.

I setup my small plein air kit close to him, it looks like a pack of cigarettes next to his rig. During the day we stop and talk to the park visitors, honestly, we posed for probably 10 photos and were captured many more times by the folks in cars who were too busy to talk.
We paint until 3 P.M. at which time Robin Straub, Phil's wife and another great plein air painter arrives to load the contraption into her 4-Runner.
Afterwards I drove out to Wolfe Ranch and hiked to the Delicate Arch Overlook. It's a short hike with the addition of a slickrock rim that rises to the east and adds an additional 1/4 mile to a point that most visitors wont ever see. I stayed on the rocks for probably another 2 hours.
It was warm and peaceful, nearly poetic in-nature.
I saw the first lizard of the year.
I saw Indian Paintbrush blooming.
I took the time to talk to some friendly looking cactus,
and I watched as silent forms of tiny people raced back and forth under the Delicate Arch, so far away that I couldn't hear their chattering.........something of Ed Abbey in all of this.

Mata Ortiz Pottery is Art

So now I have become an art trader.

 

A couple days ago a gentleman arrived in the gallery who sells pottery to art galleries throughout the southwest U.S.. The other artist and myself purchased approximately 20 pieces to resell. Since I know nothing about pottery I was relying on his advice and direction.

 

On initial examination you might think that these pots are replicas or reproductions of ancient pots used by early natives to this country but that would be wrong. What I have found out since then is that these pots are all made by hand in Mexico by a small select group of artists in the town of Mata Ortiz, hence the pots are known simple as "Mata Ortiz". It all started with a curious boy, Juan Quezada who without any outside help collected old pottery sherd's (broken pieces) and taught himself the ancient art of pottery. Here's where is gets interesting; each piece is considered an individual piece or art, no pottery wheel is used in it's formation, no stencils or airbrushes are used to paint the pots, every touch to the pot is completely done by hand, even the firing is done over cow dung (no thermostat controlled oven). 

The pottery was given the "official art" status in the mid-1970's by Spencer MacCallum who recognized the significance of the talent involved with this work.