A Closer Look
August 2025
This is a closer look at the painting Summer Skies, Mountain Belts (2025).
As I added paint to the canvas, I was thinking of a stretch of landscape between Albuquerque and Santa Fe on I-25 N. The landscape almost looks flat, but the change in colors creates depth. I see variations of greens in the foreground, from the dark green of juniper trees to softer greens of sage bushes and grasses. The blue sky and the mountains in the background stretches all along the horizon until the mountain range ends. The orange represents the feeling of summer, and how the sun’s heat beats down and hangs in the air. Keep in mind, off in the distance is the Valles Caldera, a dormant super volcano, that was formed about 1.4 to 1.1 million years ago. The alternate title for this painting was “Summer is Hot, Lava is Hotter”.
Variations of greens and the blues in the background.
Some of the shapes in the painting remind me of the features in the landscape. For example, in the second mountain belt, or mountain range, from the top of the painting, the wide “V” in the blue area (the sky) is the shape of a peak in the image below. One can see this view after they ascend the steep portion, La Bajada, on I-25 past the volcanic escarpments.
This peek inspired the wide “V” in the blue sky.
The pale pink along the bottom portion of the painting references casting light through clouds or soft shadows. The image below captures a sunrise over Santa Fe and the southern portion of the Sangre De Cristo Mountains. This view is just before the rest area between the two cities. You can see another peek popping in in the middleground.
See the soft pink? This color made its way into my painting, too.
It’s really interesting to think about how shapes shows up in my paintings. Yes, of course, I get it, but still giggle that the shape of the peek from the landscape is flipped and now is the sky in the painting. Things rattle around in my mind’s eye and then show up on the canvas. And there are probably some other connections I haven’t even made in this painting yet!