Comb Ridge, Utah - pastel

Inspired by tomorrow's trip to Cedar Mesa:  another road painting...

Towards the Comb
10x20 inches - pastel on Canson Mi-Tientes paper
© 2012, S.Johnson

Based on a photo taken last April during our first trip to Cedar Mesa/Butler Wash, this was one of those paintings that arose somewhat spontaneously.  I was preparing some of my 8x16" matboard panels for painting and thought that a 1:2 painting seemed like a good idea.  Going through my photos, this one epitomized the majestic view of the Comb Ridge monocline as seen from Hwy 95 heading west, which made it a logical choice.

Instead of using the prepared board, I thought I might try using the other half of a sheet of rust-colored Canson paper I've had for ages - seriously, I think I've been dragging this sheet around for at least 10 years.  I bought it back when Canson was pretty much the only readily available paper for pastels.

And besides - what better way to resume pastel painting after being in a recent rut than using a surface that has always proved challenging and really never produced a painting worth keeping?  Sounds like a great recipe for failure!

I was reminded again how much I admire pastelists that are able to use this paper to great success, such as Bill Cone and Lorenzo Chavez.  Really, I don't know how they do it.

I suppose this turned out better than it could have/should have, perhaps, given the circumstances.  It allows for more layering than my favorite black Artagain, but the rough texture (smooth side, even) sort of rubs me the wrong way...pun intended.  I am trying to get away from finger blending my pastels, but this just didn't seem to work without blending.

Anyway, with luck and motivation, I'll return from our trip on Tuesday with at least a few paintings and probably more photos of Anasazi cliff dwellings.

A Trip to Cedar Mesa, UT

A brief intermission from the winter and snow scenes in CO to bring you a southern Utah landscape with large rocks and a road...

In The Valley of the Gods
9x18 inches - pastel on construction paper
© 2012, S.Johnson

So, this is the painting that would have been my plein air painting, if the timing had been different.  I started it on Friday and it languished on my easel for a few days.  Unlike the recent snow scenes I've been doing, this one did not come together quickly.

On Thursday morning, we headed out for one of our favorite destinations in southern Utah:  Comb Ridge and Butler Wash.  The plan was to hike to a few ruins and petroglyph sites listed in a guidebook and then find a good location in the early afternoon where I could do a plein air painting.

Alas, it didn't happen.  The guidebook we brought to find the particular ruins (called Double Stack ruin) was so vague in its description of the route that we never found them.   Trying to find such hidden archaelogical treasures is really difficult without a GPS and reliable beta.  So, we spent far longer hiking up Comb Ridge than we'd planned, and by then, it was too late to start any painting.

But, that was a minor setback in the scheme of the trip.  Instead of risking more disappointments from said guidebook, we decided to head west along the highway and check out the BLM area known as Valley of the Gods.  Not to be confused with the Garden of the Gods, which is near Colorado Springs, this area forms what is essentially the southern edge of the Cedar Mesa.  A 17-mile loop drive on a dirt road takes you through the valley and past countless buttes, spires and amazing balanced rock formations.

If these eroded structures look similar to Monument Valley, that's because it is about 25 miles to the southwest.  Probably the same sedimentary rock, but I cannot confirm this.

Anyway, here are a few of the photos from the hike up Butler Wash.

First stop is the Wolfman petroglyph panel* - a short hike takes you to these remarkable examples of rock art.  They can be seen from several hundred feet away:

You would need a ladder to reach these.  Aren't these designs beautiful?  So precise and symmetrical - these were artists who were clearly skilled and took pride in their work.  I've often thought about how fascinating it would be to travel back 1400 years and meet the creators.

Another section with a central animal figure (it looks like an owl to me), a botanical design and maybe a staff of some sort?  

Why I love abstract art:  interpretation is up to the viewer

This makes me smile; I like to think this figure is doing a Happy Dance

Next stop: a side canyon creek in Comb Ridge...frozen solid

  No ruins to be found!

Obligatory abstract image:  detail of ice from creek

Trapped air or crystal formation?  I'm not sure, but I love the patterns created.

*Editorial note:  readers will be disappointed if visiting the Wolfman petroglyph to see that doesn't look quite like the photo - several bullet holes from vandals deface the surrounding rock facade and some of the actual art.  Sad, but true.  I opted to edit them out as best I could, since they are ugly and shouldn't be there to begin with.

Comb Ridge, moving forward....

Comb Ridge - nearing maturity

"...Downhill, maybe a mile, in one great switchback, the roadway descended through a gap to to the built-up fill across the floor of Comb Wash." -Edward Abbey in The Monkey Wrench Gang

So, after almost a week of silence, here we are.  Plans to work on this and finish it went astray as other projects and distractions came up.  This is where it is as of yesterday, and two painting sessions [the first of which was not worth posting about] from the last post on it.  

Paint finally covers the entire board, but there are areas that remain unresolved to my satisfaction - namely, the sandstone cliff regions (too light in value and there is this new Escher-esque thing happening with a section of them that needs to be addressed....do you see it?  How exactly does that happen, I wonder?).  My attempts to cool down the red slope to the right resulted in a tad over-correction of color.  It's not quite as garish as it looks in the photo here, but still no es bueno. 

I will have to cogitate a bit and decide how best to bring this painting to full adulthood.

And, what you may ask, is the relevance of the quote from Mr. Abbey above?  I happen to be reading this modern fiction classic involving the mischief and mayhem of a quartet of colorful characters bound and determined to stop interlopers with bulldozers, coal trains and such from defacing the land.  

I read this passage the other night, and realized that it describes my painting.  This is the great switchback that descends through the gap in Comb Ridge.  Comb Wash is where the bright green cottonwoods are in the painting.  Anyway, I thought it was neat and apropos.  Ed might not love the road, but he'd be glad to know that the area remains relatively untrammeled.  

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In an unrelated but exciting event, I found out yesterday that this painting

Serenity

12x18

pastel on black Strathmore

was accepted into the Durango Art Center's annual juried member show!   I helped hang the show yesterday, and while two other pieces I entered did not get in, I can not complain:  93 artists entered 190 pieces of art.  Only 60 were chosen.  Several established gallery artists, including a previous BOS winner, did not have work accepted.  Many artists had no works accepted, and I think of the list I had, only 2-3 artists had all 3 entries accepted.  One was a sculptor.  

The reception is happening shortly, and the juror (an art instructor at the local college) said he will give a talk about the works.  I'm very interested to hear what he has to say.

I decided to enter Serenity on a lark the day before the entry date; I gutted another framed and matted pastel I had in my personal collection.  This happens to be one of my personal favorites, so I'm delighted that it was accepted.

-off to the show reception now!

A painting and its life stages: I-III

Here now I thought I'd do something I don't think I've done before, and that's post a painting in-progress.  In the past, when I've shown anything of this sort, it was either a pastel underpainting or the loose burnt sienna underpainting for an oil.

I'm taking a risk posting this painting - it won't be that enticing as a thumbnail on anyone's blogroll list or on their dashboard, but that's the way it goes...

Comb Ridge Shadows Stage I - newborn underpainting

18x24 inches

oil on alkyd-primed MDF board

I've been wanting to try a larger canvas size for paintings for a while now, but for various reasons, have not.  I made one attempt this past winter, but it stumbled right out of the blocks, and promptly got axed.  In fact, this is the same panel with another coat of alkyd primer over it, and you can see a faint ghost image of the old painting through the white in the top left.

Anyway, readers may recognize this from a photo I posted about 6 weeks ago from our trip to Comb Ridge and Cedar Mesa, UT.  I decided this was a good subject to try and go "big" on.  Me and my never-ending fixation with roads and highways.

And, coincidentally, this weeks DailyPaintWorks challenge, hosted by Carol Marine, was the Value Challenge using nothing but burnt umber and the white of the canvas to create a full range of values, emphasizing the importance of value in a composition.   Unlike some of the other entries in the challenge, this one is nothing to write home about; it looks exactly like what it is:  a scrappy underpainting.  I just find it difficult to achieve anything more with Turpenoid and burnt umber - it dries very quickly and doesn't handle well.  

But, it works well as a road map for defining values and composition.

Comb Ridge Shadows Stage 2 - walking upright

I guess I've done enough oil paintings now where I know what techniques work reasonably well and what doesn't work at all.  These underpaintings work well for me.  And while I generally prefer to finish a painting in one session if I can, with a painting this size, and starting late in the afternoon yesterday with the oils, it wasn't going to happen.

I don't have the patience to paint in multiple thin layers or glazes anymore, at least for any 2D works, so I try to lay down paint quickly and just finesse things as I go, wet-in-wet.  For this painting, I decided to try the Gamblin Neo Meglip that I bought last week.  The spec sheet says it adds body to the paint.  I did find adding some to paint which was on the thicker side did much to improve its texture and spreadability.  However, it seemed to behave similar to Liquin, in that it made the paint tacky pretty quickly, making it difficult to add or rework areas after 30 min or so without pulling the paint off.  It's still sticky wet this morning on the board.  It did give a nice texture to the paint, though.

I think many artists can relate to the "ugly stage" that an awful lot of paintings go through.  It's like parts of adolescence, I think, as the painting struggles for identity and purpose at times.  Awkward and gangly and rebellious, leaving parent and teen wondering:  "will this end well?"

Comb Ridge Shadows Stage III - Teenage years

The road and sky are essentially finished.  I may come in and tweak a few parts with another layer, but no major reworking needed.   Paint now covers most of the board, save for the pale sandstone sections within the main cliffs, and the distal monocline to the far left of the horizon.  

I don't care for the burnt sienna-based red for the slopes.  Too warm.  Thinking back to the last time I was painting similar subject matter in oils, I recalled that alizarin crimson was a constant in my palette.  I left it out for this, but I see it needs to be brought in to cool down those reds; the purple lake isn't enough to do the job.  I find some annoying detail wanting to creep in there that needs to be banished as well.

We are doing our quarterly road trip to Aztec and Farmington, NM today, so the painting will have to sit in its gangly state for the rest of the day.  I hope to get more work done on it perhaps this evening, and I promise not to drag out multiple posts on its progress.  Probably one more to show its final stages and conclusion.

Comb Ridge, revisited - pastel painting

"Passage"

9x12 inches

pastel on Strathmore

Another quick piece, done this evening, based on a photo up on Comb Ridge itself taken along the hike to the Procession panel petroglyph.  I was drawn to the sweeping curves of the sandstone and the line of juniper leading up the wash.  The challenge was to try and capture the direction of the rock and avoid a flat appearance by use of pastel stroke and subtle variations of gray of the same value.

I had to rely on a flash for the photo, so the color nuances aren't as clear as they are on the actual piece.  However, I won't have access to the computer or the internet for most of the day tomorrow due to our move, so it was either now or another day or possibly two before anything was going to surface here.  

The green of the junipers becomes a key element in this painting by adding both an area of contrasting value as well as a non-linear visual path into the painting.  These are things I keep in mind when I'm composing the photo.

I'm into these green skies; they seem to harmonize better with the pale grays of the land, and of course the shrubs, than blue.

It has a more abstract feel to it than the painting from a few days ago, and is more of what I was aiming for.  

I hope to be back online tomorrow evening from our new condo!  

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A few final deck photos from our current place...

Sunset, April 19 - stratocumulus

April 20 afternoon - altocumulus and Smelter Mtn. in the spotlight

April 20 sunset - bands of cumulus mediocris 

Art of the ancients: a trip to Comb Ridge

"Towards Monarch Cave"

9x12 - graphite on paper

Finally back, sort of...a cold that decided to kick in on the day of our trip managed to take the wind out of my sails as far as getting much of anything done in my studio since our return, although I did manage to go through and edit the 300+ photos I took.

Otherwise, I did some pretty bad charcoal sketches from some of the photos yesterday, and then today, this quick pencil sketch. It probably showcases my rather weak drawing skills more than anything, but it was all I was able to muster between the headache and sinus pain that has plagued me for the past 2 days.

Back to the trip.  In a word, it was amazing.   I absolutely love this land.   As we drive and hike through the washes and along the edges of side canyons, I find myself never wanting to leave.  

Butler Wash Road & Comb Ridge

We come to explore the landscape itself, but also to experience the culture of those that inhabited the region since before the birth of Christ until the 13th century.  Evidence of their presence - cliff dwellings and rock art - is found all over the area.

Comb Ridge, our destination on Friday, is a large, 120-mile long monocline that begins about 10 miles west of Blanding, UT and runs in a north-south direction, then turning east-west before terminating near the Navajo town of Kayenta.   A photo of the southern part of Comb Ridge east of Kayenta may be seen here.

Trail to Procession petroglyph panel

A non-descript dirt road just west of Bluff, UT, heads north off of Hwy 163.  It has a small blue-and-white road marker, but otherwise, there is no indication of what it leads to.  Unlike Mesa Verde, where everything is paved and made available to the masses,  Butler Wash is a completely different experience, which is its appeal.  You have to work to get there.      

Small, unmarked spur roads are the only indication of where to stop.  Trails are also unmarked, save for the periodic BLM sign reminding you of the cultural significance of the area and to not take or disturb anything.   

View of the monocline from the trail

The hikes are pretty short - generally around a mile or so - to each of the destinations.  However, they aren't casual strolls; the trail to the Procession panel went up and down some steep slickrock, with about 600' in elevation gain.  Going to the top of the Comb and looking over the rim like we did added an extra 200' or so to that.  

Our first stop was the large section of petroglyphs known as the "Procession Panel".  Named for the 179 human figures and several animals painstakingly pecked into the sandstone face, it is a remarkable piece of art in its own right:

Procession panel panorama
[click on photo to see larger image]

The lighting was far from ideal for photography, but what are you going to do?  Take photos anyway.  It was fascinating to look at the composition of the panel:  numerous small figures converge from three directions to a circle.  Some of the human figures appear to be elders or perhaps shaman, carrying curved staffs and positioned between the smaller figures:

And, there is this group of 5 that appear to be carrying torches:

Clearly, some artisan(s) went to great effort to create this panel.   It is located a few miles in either direction from the nearest cliff dwelling, far out of the way.  So, what does it mean?  Does it symbolize the mass exodus of the people from the region to the south?  A meeting of clans?  Does each figure represent an actual individual?  One can't help but to ponder such questions while looking at the panel.  

Another 1/3 of a mile past the panel, and you come to the edge of the monocline.  Some hikers we passed told us of Moki steps (depressions carved into the rock), but we didn't look for them.  Instead, we got a panoramic view of Cedar Mesa to the west, Monument Valley to the south and Comb Wash about 1000' below.

Sleeping Ute Mountain framed by the walls of the adjacent side canyon on the way back down:

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I'll add more photos from the trip with brief descriptions in later posts, following the daily paintings.  With luck, that will be tomorrow.