Sandra Pérez: Poetry in Pastel.

North of Taos by Sandra Pérez. Soft pastel on sanded paper.

"This painting was done one afternoon in late October in a small village called Arroyo Hondo, north of Taos. The sun was beginning to set, ...with the change in light a shadow was cast, and I started to notice the petroglyphs appear, almost as if they were moving. It made me profoundly thankful for this sacred cultural legacy." Sandra Pérez

The Southwest is a place that is very alive for Sandra Pérez. The spirit of the land and of all the people and cultures that have inhabited it move through her landscapes like the winds whispering through the cottonwoods. Often painting en plein air, as she did for this painting, she moves with nature's time - the sun - as it changes the colors and reveals things heretofore hidden. Yet, as an artist, she knows that she must encapsulate the whole experience in one piece. Here the mountain is shown in full sun, revealing the markings on it. While in the canyon floor, shadows are being cast. The reflections in the water begin to darken; a plant casts a purple shadow of itself on the banks of the stream; and the tops of the grasses catch the sun while the bottoms of the conifers are already in dark shadow. The sky provides a celestial southwestern unity, and just as it is darkest before the dawn, it can be brightest before the sunset. Pérez says that she was very concentrated on the sky while doing this painting, and she indeed achieved a perfect heaven of pure Sleeping Beauty turquoise balanced by a touch of Kingman Blue turquoise in the stream.

One might think that Pérez had spent her whole life among the hills, rocks, canyons, and valleys of the Southwest. While she did grow up among the almond orchards in and around Chico, California, a large part of her adult life was spent in her successful interior design business in Seattle, WA., a profession she took with her when she moved with her husband to Santa Fe, NM. Wanting to be an artist from early childhood, through her studies for a BFA from University of Washington School of Art, she was able to live her dream of combining art and design into a career. Through it all Pérez always also did fine art, winning awards from the New Mexico Masters 2002 Show; recently First Place in juried landscape in the Associated Arts of Ocean Shores Fine Art Show in Washington State; two other awards were received from the Santa Fe Trail International Art Show in Colorado: Best of Category, Pastels and Third Place (overall show), as well as an American Artist Magazine award in Gig Harbor, Washington State. She is also an active member of the Pastel Society of the West Coast and Plein Air Painters of New Mexico.

"There is an artistic vitality to this country, and with my soft pastel palette, I love to capture the vibrant colors of Northern California, Washington State and New Mexico." Sandra Pérez

Warm Sunset by Sandra Pérez. Soft pastel on sanded paper.

In Warm Sunset, Pérez captures the absolutely golden environment of a setting sun in autumn. When she speaks of the soft pastel palette, she means her wonderful array of soft pastels from Sennelier in Paris, the very place that made pastels for one of Pérez' art heroes Edgar Degas.

In fact in looking at this Degas, Landscape with Rocks, 1892, there is something in the loose, rather abstract handling of the grasses that has obviously come down to Pérez as seen in how she handles the ground cover in Warm Sunset. Her trees blend into an area of subtle variation, flushed with the rays of the sun as it begins its descent. The tops of the green hills pick up the light yellow of the trees in much the same way as Degas, the master, takes the cadmium orange seen in the foreground grasses of his painting and uses it in the distant rocks. Pérez captures the idea of the descent of the sun with a shaded area that comes at an angle across a stand of trees, some of which have the same warm orange/brown colors seen in the foreground. That line of shadow moves at a diagonal from right to left and has a counterpart diagonal going in the opposite direction, running across the field of grasses. The same movement can be seen in Degas' painting above. Pérez, like all good artists, has incorporated into her knowledge of the medium the wisdom of a great master who came before her.

Aspen Vista, Santa Fe by Sandra Pérez. Soft pastel on sanded paper.

"As I am painting a landscape, I like to visualize how the mountains, streams and trees evolve to define what is now the beauty and excitement of this colorful land." Sandra Pérez

One thing associated with the Southwest is the aspen tree. The white trunk and branches with shimmering leaves that create a delicate rustle when the winds blow are iconic emblems, as connected to the region as the maple tree is to New England. A grove of them provided a challenge for Pérez. As she says of her process, she likes, "to focus on the subject and give myself time and patience to meditate on the creation, constantly talking to myself." Here in Aspen Vista, Santa Fe, the complexity of this grove of aspens gives the artist the opportunity to work with contrasts, some subtle and some sharp. The golden leaves, once again, are done in a range of yellows, oranges, reds, and browns to give some feeling of depth and variety. The foreground is abstract and that continues through the trees into the background, which has a touch of yellow-green to it. That abstraction continues into the distant trees because what is important is the distinct way the aspen tree trunks are done. They are a white that stands out, and their limbs are bent and twisted for a sculptural effect. It seems that a strong wind is passing through. They wisely bend to its will, for it is obvious this is not the first time they have had to do it. Yet, they do not fall. They stand, and stand out from the rest of the forest with their gold and white beauty, backed by another emblem of the Southwest, a turquoise sky.

Rock Garden by Sandra Pérez. Soft pastel on sanded paper.

It is not every artist who takes on a pile of rocks, though we have seen that Degas found them a worthy subject. Certainly the terrain of New Mexico offers a wide variety of combinations of foliage, trees, and rocks. When I asked the artist what she learns from painting the subjects she paints, she responded, "I continually learn technique, color exploration and composition structure." This painting is a study in tonal composition and awareness of how nature has formed a collage of rocks half buried in the grasses and fallen branches. One can imagine that perhaps this is part of what might have been an old creek bed, since the way the rocks angle down makes them look as though they were placed there by the force of water. Pérez captures the effect of water-wear on the top rock, which has channels that look as if formed by rivulets of water. Again one senses a feeling for the sculpture of the rocks as Pérez shows how they have been weathered by the environment. She says, " I am fascinated by the eroding hills etched by rains, the mountain ranges with colorful rock slides and the furrows carved by the winds on the mesas." Here in this microcosmic piece, she indicates the processes that shape that larger landscape that has become so iconic in our imaginations.

Durango in March by Sandra Pérez Soft pastel on sanded paper.

Seasons in the Southwest are not quite the same as elsewhere in the country. On the Pacific Coast there are basically two seasons, wet and dry. In the Southwest technically there are four, but as one can see in this piece of an area near Durango, CO, autumn is still present even in March. The snowy Rocky Mountains make a wonderful deep blue backdrop, against the turquoise of the sky. Winter is still going on up there, but here in the foreground, it is a different story. March should be the beginning of spring. Yet here we have a survivor of the fall. Pérez describes the scene this way, "This was a vast field in Durango where I found these sad, forlorn trees still clad in dry leaves. I tried to embellish their color which was parched and dry looking." The look of these forlorn trees, as she says, is contrasted with the vibrant mountains and a distant line of trees that stand up straight, showing their whitish foliage (blossoms or new buds?). They seem as though they are prepared to march straight across that field to confront these sad trees that don't know their party is over. A little stream of brackish green water seeps past the leftovers of autumn, making one wonder what would happen here once spring actually arrives bringing a full stream of water. It is a painting full of the poetry of the changing seasons and seasons of life in general, where change comes regardless of how hard one hangs on.

Sandra Pérez fell in love with New Mexico after her first visit there in 1985, and in her words, "was so moved by the colors and intense light that I returned frequently to paint the landscape." After her move to Santa Fe, she not only painted, she studied by taking courses from a master pastel artist, Albert Handel, to continue to develop her skills. Pérez always carries soft pastels and a small sketch pad with her for impromptu sketches of scenes she might later develop into paintings. She says what she loves about art is "the challenge and possibility to create an image and the joy is in the process and the resulting product." I think it also allows her a way to express the poetry in her soul.

Here is the artist in her studio, with her works in progress, and wearing a necklace of Sleeping Beauty turquoise beads.

To contact Sandra Perez, email her at

slp4736@msn.com or call 505-577-7739

For more stories of art and artists, plus some tips on fine wines, please visit my OfArtandWine.com blog, and see more on Sandra Perez in the post, "Degas Makes Pastel Landscape Dance and Pouilly Fuisse Wine."éeé

For more on Marjorie Vernelle, see the author page at amazon.com/author/marjorievernelle

She also has an engaging art history blog that talks of painting and wine on ofartandwine.com

© Marjorie Vernelle 2020

#sandraperezpainter #oilpastels #newmexico #landscapepainting #santafeartist

Lee Murphy: Fine Art and Man-Made Things.

A Day to Remember by Lee Murphy

On painting: "We are only working on one human sense. Sight. Everything else has to be imagined. I can paint fog, rain, snow, smoke, fill out sails and tilt a boat in a starboard list, but all of the atmospheric senses, feel, taste, touch, hearing, have to be imagined." Lee Murphy

In A Day to Remember, Murphy does indeed engage our senses as we look at this scene of the end of a day's sailing. Murphy provides us with an indication of the gentle movement of the water, enough for us to hear a few waves lapping against a nearby shore. A bit of brine fills the cooling evening air to tingle in our noses, while a slight taste of salt from the atmosphere has settled on our lips. We can feel the warmth of the last glimmers of a setting sun, as its fireworks light up the horizon and reflect off the clouds. The couple is bent, each one over a specific task. The man touches the rough canvas of the sail. The woman's hands wind up a sturdy rope of raspy fiber. Soon we will hear their tired feet on the wooden planks of the boat dock on their way to perhaps enjoy a dinner of seafood and a toast to the last colors of the setting sun.

For Murphy art is an endeavor that brings forth imagination. For instance here in this wonderful snow painting, Old North End Holiday Images, a name that references an area of huge, 19th and early 20th century homes near downtown Colorado Springs, we'd imagine the dedicated painter, in the spirit of Monet, braving the cold to make sketches, mapping in the outline of the house, the position of the trees, and the look of snow-laden shrubs. Au contraire!

Old North End Holiday Images by Lee Murphy

The artist did this picture of winter from a photo of the house in summer. Why you might ask? Well, Murphy likes to look at things from an unconventional perspective, sometimes pulling whole paintings just from imagination. He compares it to being in grade school when the teacher hands out a blank piece of paper and says to draw whatever you want. He says that he doesn't mind omitting things, or adding elements that draw attention to the subject of his painting. I'll let the artist explain:

"I worked from a photo of the same home in summer with lots of sun and leaves on the trees, many shadows, etc. I added snow where I thought it would pile up and most important, omitted a single story yellow bungalow which was next door so that it did not interfere with the serenity and mood of a somewhat gloomy environment or the subject home." Lee Murphy

"Home" is what leaps out at the viewer. Not unlike in Monet's, Road to Giverny in Winter, one feels the icy bite of winter cold, made more forceful by the pale bluish skies of early evening twilight and crisp white of the newly fallen snow that covers everything. Yet, one is near, very near, to that place of warm with its yellow-orange lights shining in the windows - home. One variation in this blue and white scheme is the pale lavender of the house, which adds its own slight touch of warmth, as lavender is a color with a bit of red in it. That contrast to the frosty blue shows the artist's skill at manipulating elements in the painting to focus the viewer on the main object.

Murphy spent his adult working life, first in the military as a USAF enlisted electronics technician. During a seven year period which included three assignments, he earned not one but two degrees, a B.A. in Business and an M.A. in Management. He subsequently received a direct commission as a Medical Service Corps officer and spent the next 18 years in healthcare administration, retiring as a Lieutenant Colonel. His post service career was spent conducting medical audits (accreditation surveys) on a national level. Since one of Murphy's great interest was flying, he earned his private and commercial licenses with an instrument rating. With the combined backgrounds of flying and oversight, he was invited to join the board of directors of an organization which accredited air ambulance services. He spent seven years there. With aviation as such a major part of his life, it is no wonder then that he would paint this piece of a Frontier Airlines plane, which now hangs proudly in Frontier's home office.

Frontier Airlines Jet by Lee Murphy

Murphy says that he likes to paint man-made things. He also likes to paint in oils. He says, "I have tried water colors, pen and ink, charcoal, and colored pencils, but none of these gave me the results I was seeking for the purity, control and dynamic results I found with oils." His path to being an artist began while he was in the military when he sold a few pieces of his work, after having been inspired to try painting by T.V. painting guru, Bob Ross. Murphy invested in painting materials, bought instructive books and videos, and took courses when he could. One of those was in the Netherlands where English-speaking Murphy braved a five-week painting class given in Dutch. He says the instructor tolerated his presence and encouraged his drawing of still life.

Alaska Is Calling by Lee Murphy

Murphy is also very keen on nature. In this piece, called Alaska Is Calling, he combines his love of painting man-made things with his appreciation of beautiful natural settings. His use of light and dark here work to highlight the man-made, while showing how easily what man makes is enveloped by the wilderness. The tall dark green conifers become lost in their own thick darkness, indicating deep forests all around. The home, the steps down to the water, the little motor boat, and the float plane are all in combinations of white and yellow and as such, stand out against the backdrop of green and greenish-black woods. The comfortable house with its wide terrace, complete with shade umbrella, table and chairs, and the long series of windows that let the outside in, sits atop of steep drop off that can be navigated only by means of a stairway that leads down to the water where the primary means of transportation - a float plane - rests. The sense is of peaceful isolation and restorative relaxation in the wild.

Twilight Ride in the Garden by Lee Murphy

Twilight Ride in the Garden is an apt name for a solitary bike ride in the mountainous countryside of Colorado and highlights the beauty of a very special place, The Garden of the Gods. Murphy says that Colorado "is an ideal place to live especially if you like to paint nature." His keen sense of observation of his everyday surroundings allows him to realistically represent the play of early evening light on this empty road, on the scrub brush either side of it and on the distant mountains. The famous red rocks of Colorado are shown with their shadow side facing the viewer, a more distant blue-violet hill is backed by a pale, distant, craggy ridge that is part of Pike's Peak.

Jean-Baptiste Corot, the famous 19th century French landscape painter of whom Monet say, "Corot is the father of us all," believed that one could not paint landscape without being adept at drawing the figure. It would seem that Murphy is in agreement, saying, "I purposely draw faces and figures six hours a week in real life because I have learned that it is the most difficult thing to capture accurately...On the plus side, drawing these subjects has made me a better artist. It forces me to intensely focus on shapes, edges, proportions, shadows, etc..." It is certain that working on ever improving his ability to capture what he sees and to make decisions about what works best to convey what he wishes, only works to further the career of his "golden years" through gallery representation, awards, and commissions.

"Art has brought me a great deal of pleasure in many settings.The awards earned are easy measures of one's success. Being accepted into various organizations and obtaining signature status is another accolade. My only complaint was not getting an earlier start in art...But you work with what you have and strive for improvement in every endeavor." Lee Murphy

Here he is in action, taking part in a plein air painting session.

Murphy's work is shown in Gallery 113 in downtown Colorado Springs.

He is also represented by Turquoise Door Gallery in Telluride, Colorado.

You may contact Lee Murphy at leemurphy3@msn.com (719) 460-7130

and leemurphyfineart.com

All paintings used here are used with the permission of the artist.

For more on Marjorie Vernelle, see the author page at amazon.com/author/marjorievernelle

She also has an engaging art history blog that talks of painting and wine on ofartandwine.com

© Marjorie Vernelle 2020

#leemurphy #landscapepainting #oilpainter

Michael Baum: Pursuing the Landscape

Evening at the Bluffs by Michael Baum, 24" x 52" oil on canvas.

Looking at a Michael Baum landscape can really take you places. He comments that this painting says "adventure" to him, and he is correct. In looking at this painting, once you take in the wonder of the setting sun's light on the face of these bluffs and the drama of that threatening storm cloud, a story begins. You find yourself making your way down that road into the valley. Except it no longer is a road, but an ancient footpath through the scrub brush. It is the path the first Native people used when they happened upon this magnificent place. You become part of a group of ancient wanderers and see the high ridge of red rock as they must have, another sign of the greatness of Manitou, the spirit that moves all things. The gray clouds rising from behind the bluffs spread out toward your tiny band of travelers. The beauty of the heavens holds danger. A flash of lightning in that ominous blue-gray vapor signals that it is time to set up camp, which is hurriedly done before a display of lightning bolts begins to dance off the tops of the cliffs. As the thunder rumbles, a prayer is given to ask those clouds for the gold of the Southwest: a few drops of rain.

Well, that is only one of the "adventures" you can have when looking at one of Baum's landscapes. My supposition as a native Nebraskan is that Baum, who was born in Oklahoma, has an innate love of vast landscapes just by dint of where he was born. His family moved off to Ohio when he was young. They vacationed in Michigan and Florida, traveling like many Americans with a trailer attached to the back of the car. He counts those childhood travels and camping trips as some of his fondest memories. In terms of his drawing and painting, in those childhood years it was mostly dinosaurs, which are again big and dramatic. Do we see a theme emerging?

"I've been exploring the West more than 40 years and barely scratched the surface" Michael Baum.

Along the Colorado by Michael Baum 18" x 24" oil on linen. SOLD

Of this scene called, Along the Colorado, near Moab, Utah, Baum writes, "Tendrils of cool air reach out from the shadows and mingle with the day's heat. There are petroglyphs on the cliff walls. People have loved this place for a long time." In capturing that feeling of heat and the need to refresh oneself, Baum has created in paint the varying depths of the water. On the right, a sandy strip of land fronts small patches of light water, some sand-colored, obviously all shallow enough to wade in. Slight, white ripples appear on the surface of the river to represent an evening breeze blowing downstream between the rock cliffs. On the left, in the shadows, the water is still and deep. That deep water is indicated by the long shadowy reflection of the cliff face that seems to plunge into those depths. Baum handles the varying greens of the vegetation masterfully, with deep green for the foliage in shadow, and yellow green for the shrubs on the sunlit riverbank. Close up is a bush with a hint of that yellow, subdued by the shadow of the cliffs. That touch of dull yellow ties in with its more brightly lit companions across the river, allowing the eye to unify the elements of the painting.

In Storm Over the Paint Mines (see below), Baum once again explores his favorite subjects, "soaring cliffs, stormy skies...and the vastness of the Southwestern landscape." The Paint Mines are in a special geological area east of Colorado Springs in which the rock formations are in layered colors. This rather rare condition also happens in Roussillon, France, where it is known locally as the "Colorado" of France. There they make pigments from those colorful rocks. Here in Baum's painting, the blue-violet of distant rains allows for a faint rainbow while the colors of the earth fall into shadow. The sun is low in the west, as seen by how its light hits only the tops of the hills. This painting looks a bit to the north and east, where its storm clouds, a combination of bluster and beauty, are probably headed to the prairies of Nebraska.

Storm Over the Paint Mines by Michael Baum, 30" x 40" oil on canvas. SOLD.

Baum sometimes plays coy when talking about his painting. "I don't like to get fanciful about my painting, " he told Rhonda Van Pelt of the Colorado Springs Examiner (online) in an interview (2010). "For me, it is just what I do. I paint...no airs about it." Rather like John Ford, the film maker who declared he just made "westerns," underplaying his artistic cinematography that showcased the beauty of the landscape of the Southwest, Baum's focus on certain painting challenges underplays his regard for the majesty of the settings he paints. However when you read his online journal of fascinating stories about the places he paints and his physical and perceptual adventures in those settings, it is clear that just as the fabulous landscape of the Southwest is one of the stars in Ford's movies, it also stars in Baum's paintings. The brief descriptions Baum writes to go along with the paintings displayed in his monthly newsletter indicate someone with poetry in his soul which, of course, reveals itself in his paintings.

As a young man studying for his B.F.A. at Wright State University in Ohio, he certainly was exposed to the works of many other artists. His very favorite is Edward Hopper. "I like that kind of quiet and solitude," Baum says. "He'd pick a moment and just present a scene." Among Baum's own works there are paintings of gasoline stations and roadside cafes, perhaps from his childhood memories of traveling in Florida, done in a Hopperesque style. In A Nod to Mr. Hopper (see below), he pays direct homage to this American master, especially in his careful rendering of that 1930s-style building.

A Nod to Mr. Hopper by Michael Baum, 12" x 24" oil on linen. SOLD

This painting's juxtaposition of that '30s building, complete with city lamplight, and the open countryside of farm buildings and distant mountain ridges seems not unlike Hopper's Rooms by the Sea (1951). In that painting Hopper has hotel rooms with doors that open straight out into deep ocean water with no steps, beach, or other transition between them. Baum does much the same thing here. The sharp contrast between urban and rural is too stark for this just to be a painting of the last building in town. Baum says of this painting,

"A streetlight illuminates its [the building's] bulk in a dim glow, casting it into its own silent world. It's a world isolated from the rest of the painting, a world that Hopper would recognize." The main idea presented here is of solitary isolation that can happen in the city just as it does in the distant countryside.

Baum talks of the changes that he has gone through during his career as an artist. Realism seems always to have been his foundation, but certain events in his personal life made him break with it for a while. In the 1990s he moved into a more whimsical style. It was fun and a relief he says from his sorrow at the death of his father and from a job he did not particularly like.

November 2 acrylic on cut outs and layered panels, 32" x 32"

El Día de los Muertos (The Day of the Dead) is a Southwestern tradition dating from the region's time as part of Mexico. Celebrated on November 2nd each year, it is a time when people mock human folly with skeletons dressed up as we dress and doing our daily activities. Here Baum presents a fanciful and personal interpretation of the theme, keeping to decorative elements in alignment with the culture of the region. He paints two skeletons driving an old truck, their graves well marked by white crosses. The "calaveras" or skulls as these images are known represent the artist and his wife. A painted photo of the couple in their youth sits in a window not far from a candle in the wind. That painted photo can be dated by comparing the small version of the tree in the painted picture to the enormous tree that shades the graves. Time has passed, but the beautiful blue-violet mountains remain.

"I pursued the landscape in art through a variety of styles and media, now working exclusively in oils." Michael Baum

One Bright Day by Michael Baum, oil on linen 16"x 36"

Of the painting, One Bright Day, Baum says, "I love to paint light and distance." The artist says that the day was one of 100 degree heat, so hot that nothing moved. In his opinion "even time stood still." He creates a wonderful stillness in this painting. We have no signs of ripples across the water to give us the direction of the wind. There is no water. There are no trees to sway. The little tufts of vegetation are low to the earth, holding on for dear life to whatever moisture their roots may have found deep down below the surface. The boulders and the nearby ridges have a whitish highlight on them, a glare from the unrelenting sun. No birds dart about, let alone chirp or sing. Any reptiles are well hidden below those boulders, which themselves once cracked off from the ridges and tumbled down below, a warning of what extremes of heat and cold can do to stone.

However well the mood was captured, for the artist the focus was on the light and the distance and how to capture them. While the rocks, earth, and vegetation up close are quite clearly defined, the distant mountains, the Vermillion Cliffs, are not so distinct. Though not a mirage, they seem to dwell behind a veil of heat induced haze, their particular characteristics not sharply in focus. The sun lights up the many variations within the cliffs but not distinctly. The blue-violet colors of the cliffs become closer to the blue of the sky as the eye moves up the cliff face to the top. Even the clouds that drift in the sky are rather hazy and certainly nothing like the well-formed storm clouds that Baum is so famous for creating. One looks at this painting and recognizes what we experience when the heat of the day affects the way we see what is before us. You can almost feel the heat radiating from the painting itself, and you certainly sense the still silence of the setting.

Promise of Rain by Michael Baum with Michael Baum. Photo by Patrice Rhoades-Baum

If you haven't yet been convinced of what I mean when I say that Baum is a master painter of clouds, just take a look at this piece. It is called Promise of Rain, that element that Southwesterners pray for.

The dry land in the foreground has some minimal greenery, but the hills just beyond are a thirsty, dusty, yellow-brown. However, further on and not too far away, the blue-violet rains are pelting down. The direction of the clouds, which bloom out toward the viewer, indicate that rain is on the way.

And so it goes with Michael Baum and his life-long adventure in painting. I can only say that the Southwest never looked so good.

Mike Baum, "Welcome to my studio." Photo by Patrice Rhoades-Baum

For more paintings and contact with Michael Baum, you can check out his website: michaelbaum.com

Baum's work is also found in

Manitou Galleries, Santa Fe, NM

Fine Arts Center Colorado Springs

FAC Museum Shop

Summit Gallery, Park City, Utah

Boulder Arts and Crafts Gallery, Boulder, CO.

Sources:

Paintings and michaelbaum.com website information used in this post are used with the permission of the artist.

Interview, "Portrait: Michael Baum" by Rhoda Van Pelt for the Colorado Springs Examiner (Examiner.com) (2010)

For more on Marjorie Vernelle, see the author page at amazon.com/author/marjorievernelle

She also has an engaging art history blog that talks of painting and wine on ofartandwine.com

© Marjorie Vernelle 2020

#michaelbaum #manitougalleries #southwesternlandscapes #landscapepainting