Summer Sun Rays

Its an interesting thing about painting on location. On occasion unexpected things appear as if by magic in my compositions. I never know exactly but it could be just the very act of splashing watercolor on a large sheet of paper held by a tipsy easel in the sunshine with nothing but fresh air and an occasional zephyr to interrupt my train of thought. I am so at oneness with nature during these times that little can interrupt the magical transference of my colors to the paper.

It was a day of wispy clouds which precede the thunderheads that build their majestic formations over the Kiabab and produce a shower or two of sweet smelling rain. The cedar trees were producing rolling patterns on the golden brush below them.  Occasional clumps of turquoise sage rested above a vermillion wash bank just before me.  These were my focus.

I don't remember actually painting the rays of sunshine that shone on the summer slopes...it just happened. But these accidental happenings are what make the medium of watercolor so very special. I loved the effect and hope that you will enjoy it to!

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Summer Sage And Sacred Detura

This painting is just the essence of July in the southern Utah desert. Filled with color and warmth it cries out for a hike in bare feet, the warm coral sand caressing your toes just so gently. Once in a while you run across a sacred detura plant. Deep blue green foliage hosts a spectacular lily like flower of pure white. They say the plant is poisonous and that it is halucinagenic.as well. It likes the sandy washes and makes itself at home there.

I painted this scene in 1976, when my third son was just a baby. Mimi sat under a tree close to his playpen and I painted and we talked of the wonder of the country, and how happily the baby cooed  in the warm sunshine. I found such great joy of splashing the watercolors on my paper. My heart was happy and my older sons played with their metal cars on the wash bank. I would call out to them,"What are you building?" The older one replied, "I'm constructing a fire station and I have a grocery store, and a gas station to go with it."

The younger son, Marc replied with great passion, " I'm building a nation!"
How my heart swelled with love and gratitude for my little family all around me. My brush worked with tenderness and just enough playfulness to make my painting dance to the music of my heart!

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Roadside Thistles Near Zion

Zion National Park holds many beautiful treasures to the fortunate person able to behold her splendor. I have always been fascinated by the elegant white blossoms of the thistles that grow along the roadside in mid July. You dare not touch them as they are full of thorns that scream 'stay away', and yet they are so lovely with their pure white petals and silky appearance with just a touch of yellow gold at the center.

 I set up my easel in one of the most beautiful areas of the park. I loved it because the day was just recovering from a thundershower and the mountain ridges were caught in a symphony of golds and lavender and raw sienna passages that were framed by the waning of the storm clouds giving rise to delicate rays of the sun that colored the mountains with a silvery light.

Contrasts of color and value add interest to paintings and to life. Like the primitive beauty of the thistles, the magic of this moment only lasts fleetingly. It is up to each of us to take the time out of the chaos that surrounds our busy lives to enjoy the moment and be alive in it right then and right there. Some of these moments are caught by a memory or a photograph or an artists painting and live on to add inspiration and a bit of beauty to our lives. For these precious moments I am grateful!

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The primitive beauties of the high desert.

Kanarraville, Utah

Sitting at about 5,500 feet, Kanarraville  is a beautiful little Utah town. The afternoon Mimi and I and the boys and darling baby Elisa drove up to see what we could find that was pretty to paint, there it was. Iron County has its particular share of beauty, but this was just oh so amazing. I ran to set up my easel and put out my watercolors as the dark forms of storm clouds collected overhead and promised an abundance of rain!

Blackness of the storm stood strong against the mountains. It was a study of contrasts in action.
The afternoon sun shed shreds of light on the delicate foliage in front of me, and the dark prongs of last summers fire stood silently against the velvet mountains. The last of the spring grasses created a horizontal passage of rich yellow green. I painted like mad before the clouds let loose and Mimi shooed the boys back to the truck. The painting could have had a bit more detail, but Mimi and I loved it just the was it was.

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                                 Before the storm.Summer 1982.

Water Canyon Staging Area

Water canyon was the next canyon over from Maxwell canyon. On a summer day it was a good hike over to the staging area that was comprised of this little pasture surrounded by cedar trees and turquoise sage. A string of old cedar posts still remained on one side complete with a wire gate.
One could actually drive this far up Water canyon without fear of getting stuck in the sand which would drift over the primitive roads and make traveling very difficult.
When a longer hike was planned this shady area was perfect to transfer our backpacks to our own backs and prepare to make the more difficult hike up the canyon switchbacks to the top country.
This was the magical land that my Uncle Jon wrote about in his books. It was the land of the Raindrop That Never Fell, one of the most beautiful natural lakes around. We were ready!

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Canyon Reservoir

Canyon Reservoir

The Old Reservoir

Lined with graceful aspen trees, the old reservoir could hold a little water, or with enough rainfall, a lot. It was a perfect place to hike up to and paint. Mimi and I would make the small journey up the sandstone trail once in a while just to see how much water was there.

I loved to see the reflections of the trees in the water, contrasted with the red sand flanking its shores. Deer would come here in the early morning and we could see their tracks, and many other desert animals would come to this spot as well.

Mimi loved foxes. She loved their expressive faces and the way the luxurious coat would go to black on the slender legs. We had a fox all one summer. He would come to the cottage patio and see what delectable scrap Mimi had left for him. Mimi would look for fox tracks on the damp sand and once in a while she would find some. "I wonder if that is our fox." she would say to no one in particular.

On the morning that I painted this watercolor, storm clouds had gathered and there was a promise of a shower in the very near future. I splashed in the cliffs and the aspens and the cedars just ahead of the rain. Sometimes picking a time to paint the wild outdoors can present an unexpected challenge.
Oh, but it is always worth it!

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Land Beneath The Tumurru

The Arizona Strip country is vibrant and full of color. The year is 1910, and Mimi was just five years old when her father packed up their belongings and moved to Maxwell Canyon where he hoped to become a farmer with a small herd of cattle.

Though it was dusty and she was tired from the long trip, Mimi peered out of the buckboard to see majestic vermillion cliffs rising two thousand feet off the canyon floor. She couldn't know that three of her brothers would build small stone houses in this wild and beautiful land, or that she would help her older brothers in bringing precious water from the top of those immense cliffs to the valley below in wooden flues or that it would take many years to make this a reality.

Right now Mimi knew she was tired and hungry and she longed for the wagon to stop its endless journey so she and her family could have homemade bread and fresh peaches for lunch.

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Journey Across The Arizona Strip

The Special Grove

There is a grove of trees near the cottage in the canyon that is special to our family for many reasons. The tiny grove gives welcome shade in the summer months and provides the southern border for the flagstone patio where Mimi and I would sit at night and drink lemonade and watch the brilliant stars above and an occasional shooting star pass overhead.

On one outing to the cottage and the grove, Mimi brought her friend Flo to visit. Flo was a very outspoken lady and tons of fun to be with. She also had a gift. She could find pots buried in the red earth from long ago. Now I don't know exactly how in the world she accomplished this amazing feat, but Mimi and I were fascinated!

She would patiently wait for her inspiration, and then, with a garden trowel that Mimi kept in her supplies, she would begin to dig in the soft, forgiving earth. She was heavy in stature and she would begin to perspire, and Mimi would bring her a lemonade from the cooler in the cottage. Flo would sip on the lemonade and talk about the Indians she loved so much. I think that she may have been descended from one of the Lamanite tribes who lived in this country many years ago.

Then she would return to her digging. To our amazement she would uncover a tiny part of a pot!
Then she would dig in another place and bring up more pieces. How she did this Mimi and I couldn't imagine, but she kept us  in stitches laughing the whole two days of her visit!

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Cattle On The Kolob

Cattle On The Kolob

It was mid summer when a group of friends invited Miri and the kids to spend the night on the Kolob mountain south of Cedar City, Utah. There are signs that direct you to the Kolob off Interstate 15. It seemed like we drove for miles up the canyon roads before we got to the lake and the grasslands that were home to a small band of cattle. What a  pretty place it was with the lake and the sandy shore.

We put our sleeping bags in the back of the truck and built a small campfire in a pit that had been built for that purpose. The altitude was pretty high and the evening cooled down fast. But the real fun came when we roasted marshmallows over that fire pit. My friend, Mary, had made potato salad and I had brought the hotdogs, buns and stuff.

We could hear rustlings in the bushes but we gave it little thought. Time came for us to snuggle down for the night. And what a night it turned out to be. The gentle rustlings turned out to be quite a large family of skunks who chased each other all night long around the grassy field. They shrieked, grunted and made the most high pitched squeals as they played! The air was full of their scent and we all tried to stay under our covers!

By morning they were all worn out and went back to their homes, wherever that was. The boys had cereal and bananas and went for a frigid swim in the lake. The cattle came down for their morning drink and the aspens rustled in the clean fresh air. I painted while everyone played.

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Midnight Pony

This cute painted pony now lives in the home of Carol's grandson who is two and a half.
Carol has been my student for many years and is a talented artist who has faithfully painted and made a commitment to herself that only discipline and hard work are the answer to becoming really good.

Those who see her work are amazed at how good she is. I am not amazed. I have seen her grow and struggle and laugh softly at herself as she relentlessly pursues her dream of learning to paint. I am very proud of Carol and am honored to be her teacher.

This cute pony is part of the illustration endeavors I create for my ETSY site, TwoPaintedPonies.  I have loved painting colorful, decorative illustrations since I was a child and would put paper books together of childlike stories, usually about horses, and illustrated them with my drawings.

I love color and contrast and enjoy experimenting with simple elements of design. Simplicity is the key. I usually make a black and white sketch in my journal of the idea I wish to execute. I make a simple center of interest:a pony, a bird, a baby llama, a mermaid, or a unicorn. From this very simple concept a design is developed in my mind, and I use the five elements of contour shape: a dot, a straight line, a curved line, an angle and a circle to make interesting designs on my composition.

This is pretty much the opposite mindset I use when creating my fine-art paintings. Illustrations, to me, are very controlled, while my paintings reflect the wild and free area of my heart  and are for the most part spontaneous and intuitive.

Much like my dad who animated some of the most treasured characters we have grown to love, he also had a painting side as an impressionist. Two very opposite places in the mind!

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This is a painting of Maxwell Canyon during a summer in the early seventies. It had a special place on my mother, Mimi's wall for many years. I can guess why she had such affection for it. She used to gather wild flowers there in that beautiful little valley in the summertime. We would travel to the canyon on a Greyhound bus and my uncle Jon would meet us at the bus station.

The next thing I knew we were unfolding the bed with its blue striped mattress cover. Mimi would keep our bedding in plastic bags to keep out the red dust and an occasional daddy long legs spider.
We placed the bed by the patio door in the large room opposite the fireplace.

We lit a kerosene lamp and ate home made bread that my aunt Verda made with fresh milk from the evening milking. It was just oh so good. We crawled into bed and snuggled under the down comforter and pretty soon it was morning and the sun was streaming through the cottage windows and my mom was no where to be seen.

Then I heard her footsteps and she came in through the west door her arms holding a large bouquet of wildflowers, and Grandma's nightcaps. She hummed as she placed them in a large bowl on the table and spent several minutes arranging them. Mimi was beautiful and graceful as she worked and to my four year old mind I was the luckiest little girl in the world.

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Pipe Springs Pooches

Pipe Springs is between Fredonia AZ and Hildale UT several miles off Hwy 389.  It served as a resting place for travelers in early years of the 1900s.  There is a natural spring that provides cool water for radiators and people and people's critters.  My mother, Mimi, my four children and I would travel to Pipe Springs where I could set up my easel and paint the old flagstone buildings that are still there.

Indigenous to the area are cedar trees which grow at about an altitude of 5000 feet. Crude fences are fashioned from these trees.  The fence posts have wire between them to keep the livestock in place. 
Six pane windows have been beaten on for years by the wind and the rain. They are made of real wood and can be opened the old  fashioned way...by hand.

I painted this on location in the late morning, when the bright sunlight was just arresting the color from the vermillion rocks. In a few hours the old place would have a completely different look. Sometimes we made several trips to Pipe Springs to complete a painting.

Mimi would read and the children would play tag among the surviving cedar trees. Summer is so much fun!

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Indian Rain Pools

Indian Rain Pools

I have always been fascinated by the sculpturing of rock and sandstone by the inhabitants of the Arizona Strip country in southern Utah. Many of these indentations and holes, which are deep enough to grind seeds and shelled nuts, were made by the Navajo Indians many years ago.

My mother, also Miriam, and I hiked inland to a clearing near what is known as the Gap not far from Hurricane, Utah. I drove my pickup as far in as I could and unpacked my portable easel and watercolors, and then, four lively children from the truck.

It was a beautiful day in July when I painted this on location watercolor. The four kids set out to explore the turquoise sage, rabbit brush, and the ant hills which used to be a foot high!  Mimi, her nickname, which means 'grandma' in French, was just as excited as can be to tell me about the holes in the white sandstone rocks that collected rain when it fell.

"They used to be full of seeds, and the Dine, or Navajo women, would grind the seeds with oblong stones they could hold in their hands, until they had made a kind of meal they fashioned into dough. These holes now collect water that the desert birds and animals can drink on a hot summer day!"

We rested in their shade, ate sandwiches and drank lemonade watching the summer clouds and thunderheads collect over the red desert floor.

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A Painting for Carol

Yesterday, a dear friend, Carol Bentley came to my home in Queen Creek, Arizona. She had just bought a sweet little home in Saint George, Utah and wanted a painting that would brighten and bring cheer to her new environment and choose this floral watercolor painting for her living room. Of course it will look stunning all framed and hanging on her wall!

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Hewitt Canyon Rider

I have known intimately the joy of exploring on horseback the mountain trails of the Superstitions and San Tan Mountains with their warm winds, Javelina and the bounding desert jacks. Red tailed hawks soar above the brilliant Ocotillo and California springtime poppies. My paintings reflect the reverence I feel for this magnificent country and the riders who explore her winding and elusive trails.

My genesis is the set of "Anything Goes", where my father, Les Clark, the first of the Nine Old Men at Disney Studios, met my mother, Miriam Marlin, a 1934 Wampus Baby star. I "grew up" under a movieola at Walt Disney's studio.

I have been part of the High Sonoran Desert for many years, finding inspiration for vibrant and textured paintings of modern riders of the contemporary Southwest. I like to work bold and spontaneous, yet love using gentle and elusive passages of intricate splashes of turquoise, gamboges and vermillion.

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Hewitt Canyon Rider