This cliff face in Bandolier National Monument (New Mexico) still fascinates me. Not only is it imposing to sit at its foot, even though it's probably only 70 feet tall, but it is pocked with the small pits and recesses of the massive amounts of homes that were built against it, perhaps 800 years ago, by a stone age society. The place still echoes with the sounds of Indian children playing and mothers grinding corn in metates. Drawings fill the cliff walls, and man's hand is clear in every curve of the sandstone. Deer feed on the grass just tens of feet from the tourist trail.This particular image, however, draws me like a magnet because the little cloud curled so far above the cliff line is a mirror of the rocks below, like the outline of South America that appears in the west coast of Africa. Just color me romantic.
Mostly, I'm just happy to get an image down on paper. If I can't do a painting, well, nothing is really going right.
9 comments:
Edgar - Found your blog through Malinda's. Wonderful work here.
Cara, All your feedback is appreciated. And I like your art blog, as well as hearing from a fellow southwesterner. I love the 'virtual studio tour' you've put up!
Melinda's Moments of Clarity remains an inspiration and a favorite.
(I should learn to spell... or type.. sigh... trying again..)
I think seeing what other people are creating is inspiring...
I'm not a watercolorist, but I enjoy seeing the images you've created.
How do you put in links in comments..... are you a web-techie-person as well as an artist?
Marian -- "inspiring" is absolutely the word. And if it weren't for the internet, I don't know where I'd get inspired, because my little city has a very closed arts community.
I'm very interested in the kinds of cross-pollination we can get from looking at each other's work, and from discussions... although these comments are a bit like telegraph messages, rather than conversations (full stop)
And yes, my job has made me pretty much an internet techie -- more HTML code than an artist like you ought to have to know. I can explain how to put links in comments, if you know how to cut and paste -- but it's too much for a comment.
Edgar - in the spirit of full disclosure I have to state for the record that I'm from New Mexico but took a wrong turn somewhere and ended up in Missouri (of all places). Still, my heart belongs to The Land of Enchantment - hope to return one day.
There's a lovely freshness and boldness in the watercolour washes here that I admire. I also particularly like your seeing the image of rock and sky connected with the blurred shrubs along the escarpment.
Last year, at about this time, I went on solo vacation to an island off the West coast of Scotland (Arran) and lost myself in the mystery of the structures built by early (now vanished) settlers. I always find this kind of thing extemely stimulatating to my imagination! See here:
http://daviddrawsandpaints.blogspot.com/2007/11/winter-solstice.html
Cara -- I'm beginning to think that once the desert's gotten into our bones, we carry that dryness and heat wherever we go. It calls to us when we're in cold and wet places. And so do the sunsets and the color of the cactus flowers. That keeps showing up in your work.
David -- Thank you for the careful observations, it's high praise to be taken seriously. Your triptych is gorgeous... and there is something comforting in the enduring monuments these forebears have made, that answers a need in us to know that when we're gone, we're not altogether forgotten. Or maybe its just ghosts (jk).
I like this watercolor, well done.
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