Hi, there. For those of you who are kind enough to continue checking in I am going to post two posts a month and will add the new work accordingly when available. At the moment I am nearing the completion of a large 30x40 Grand Canyon scene. I hope to finish it in the next few days and will post it then. I am having a very good time with it and after doing commissions for a while it is nice to dive into something different.
As you may remember when last I wrote I was adjusting to life in Phoenix and believe me the difference between here and my cabin in Nye are profound. I am getting more used to it though, and the other day was a good example of what I mean. I had just redone the Lake Plateau painting ( in New Work) and was ready for a little break when my mother showed up for a visit. We went into downtown Scottsdale to check out the galleries. When in such places I often try to seem like a wealthy art patron of leisure but for some reason the people working in them generally peg me for a starving artist and this time at the Legacy Gallery was no exception.As I was wandering around some of the greatest contemporary art in the world a very helpful young lady came up and asked if I was going to submit something in the upcoming Salon show they were planning. Not wanting to seem as ignorant as I was, I told her no, I didn't think so but maybe another time. She said that the deadline to submit was in three days so there was still time if I hurried. She gave me a flier with the info just in case I changed my mind. I left still confounded as to why is it they always know I'm not a wealthy patron...I was even wearing my best shirt! Anyway, after sleeping on it a couple of days and looking at the three recent pieces finished since arriving in town I thought what the heck, nothing to lose but the entry fee. So, I went on line, pulled up the paperwork, wrote out the entry fee check, burned photos of the three pieces onto a disc and as it was the last day to submit, hopped on my bicycle ( for I am still too spooked to drive in this grand prix they call Phoenix) and pedaled down to the art district. There are bike trails everywhere and more my speed.( Besides, my truck looks silly next to the BMW's at the stop lights.) When I got to the gallery district there was a gal playing some pleasant and relaxing riffs on her guitar as I locked the bike to a post. Naturally, even though it was different sales person, and even though I had put on my best shirt the first person I saw didn't even break stride to ask if she could answer any questions about the art. Instead, she just asked if the envelope in my hand was my submission. I told her yes and thank you and as I left the gallery it seemed obvious enough to me that once again the universe has knocked and somewhere along the line I must have entered into another vision quest in the long line of them that has made up my life.
When I got back out to the bike I felt so good I tipped the guitar player one of my hard earned dollars ( we artists stick together) and walked my bike along the windows of the gallery to see how others were doing it. This is an interesting town... As I was staring at a painting of the Grand Canyon giving the artist a mental critique on his use of light I heard the words of an old western song I have long favored: " I can tell by your outfit that you are a cowboy." I turned to find myself looking across the street at a cowboy dressed like he had just arrived with a herd of cattle sitting on a fine paint horse. He was playing his guitar up there and seemed to be looking right at me. We were on opposite sides of a busy downtown street with people wandering all over and around. At first the horse stood so still I thought it was a statue, but then it moved it's head a little. The singing cowboy was doing a tolerable good job with the old classic and standing right in the horses face was some nitwit dressed up in his western outfit as well. From the looks of him he hadn't been on many horses and was gabbing away like a bangee while the other guy played for tips. I turned back to observing the Grand Canyon and when I looked back horse, rider, nitwit and all were gone and only a street full of people mingled on their journeys. Now I knew I was on a vision quest.
Anymore, it is my opinion that when ever one finds oneself on a vision quest it is fun to see what might happen next and best to ride it out if for no other reason than to see where it goes. Next on the agenda for this one I was led through the sunny streets of Scottsdale to the stable that holds the horses for the carriage rides. ( I think my nose was in on that one for it was good to smell horses again.) A cowgirl was up in the seat of a carriage having some lunch between rides. A beautiful big black Percheron horse stood patiently in harness. The cowgirl pointed me to the Trailside Gallery just through the park with the bronze herd of running horses. As I peddalled away I looked in the eye of the Percheron. He nodded.
In 1986 I was a young packer and wrangler working the hunting camps around Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and when between go rounds I would often hang out at the Trailside Gallery dreaming about what it would be like to be a great enough painter to hang my work there. After all these years I still do that and this day was no exception. I checked out every single painting in the place. By the time I was done I felt like sitting down. Next door I found a little cantina that served their beer cold and had a seat in the sun where one could listen to a couple more guitar players plying their trade. There sure seemed to be a lot of guitar players on this vision quest. As it turned out, the best were still to come.
On the way home I stopped for an Italian gellatto at a little place by a lake. The lake had a fountain spouting water 20 feet in the air and as I was sitting in the warm sun resting from my ride and enjoying the view a HUGE bobcat suddenly dashed out of some bushes! He ran along a stucco wall but stopped for a moment next to a little tunnel. There were other people out on the terrace but they must either be real used to seeing 35 pound bobcats running around or they didn't see him. They music kept playing and everybody was still murmuring in their own conversations. Like the cowboy guitar player the bobcat seemed to look right at me. Then in a twinkling he disappeared into the tunnel! Definite vision quest stuff if you ask me! I whipped out the cell phone to call Lynn and tell her about the bobcat. As it turned out she was herself on a bike ride and was only about two minutes away. Before long she appeared and the quest sent us pedalling along the lake into the sun. We wound up at the very upscale Scottsdale Hyatt Regency Hotel where we ordered up some sushi and a glass of wine. From our outdoor seating we could gaze across another fountain in another lake, ( sure a lot of water in this part of the desert...), admired the golf course gardens and such while the sun sank in the west and lit up the mountains across the desert to the east ( You get a pretty darned good view from such a posh vantage point). It wasn't long before a bunch of musicians gathered and the sound of Spanish Guitars floated into the evening. Just when I thought things couldn't get better a couple of Flamenco dancers came out and I was transported to Barcelona. It was dark and the streets were quiet as we bicycled home in the warm glow of the evening and I can't help but think that was one fine vision quest. Thanks for hearing about it.
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