Waiting On Sunset: Fine Art isn't Just About the Painting
Posted by Lindy C Severns at 11/5/2008 6:43 PM 
Categories: Around Far West Texas,Painting,Artist and Gallery
Tags: Marfa TX Chinati Peak Ranching in West TX Lindy at Kiowa Gallery Alpines ArtWalk and Gallery Night
Categories: Around Far West Texas,Painting,Artist and Gallery
Tags: Marfa TX Chinati Peak Ranching in West TX Lindy at Kiowa Gallery Alpines ArtWalk and Gallery Night
My man Jim (a pro at waiting on me) waits for the sun to set in Pinto Canyon south of Marfa, TX.
If it doesn't set soon, we won't get back through Marfa in time for pizza.
This place we call Far West Texas is big country. You think you've seen it all, then someone says, hey, have you driven Pinto Canyon? And suddenly, you have someplace new to investigate. In this case, Pinto Canyon was on the short list of places Kiowa Gallery owner Keri Artzt suggested I consider painting for this year's Alpine's ArtWalk/Gallery Night collection.
If you've followed this blog, or conversed with me in the last couple of months, you'll know Keri requested a giant-sized sunrise and an even larger sunset, pastels to hang side-by-side on the gallery's main wall. Not just any landscape translates into super-sized pastels. And the road never (yet) traveled beckons, always.
Pinto Canyon falls about 75 miles south of home (less than that as the turkey vulture flies, but the vultures didn't build the roads around here). The next 35 miles is on dirt. On a roadmap, this scenic route (if it appears at all) is a faint dotted line through vast, deserted ranchland. Its single lane is notorious for turning suddenly impassable (mud) and for relentlessly shredding tires. No towns, no people, no phone service once we left Marfa. An adventure in a land of adventure.
We decided this meant traveling way too far before sunrise—my dedication to my art goes only so far, even with Jim and a Thermos of hi-test at my side. To get to Pinto Canyon, we'd skirt Fort Davis, then pass through Marfa before we dropped off the map of the civilized world. We'd also pass by Marfa's Pizza Foundation before venturing into the wilderness of the borderlands. If we timed it right, that meant passing back through Marfa as the aroma of pepperoni and oregano wafted from those pizza ovens. Sunset it was.
After much exploring on the ranch road, I return to plant my feet.
The sun is still too high.
We wait.
We left home mid-afternoon. The winding pavement narrowed as we meandered south at 45 mph across rolling hills broken by rocky bluffs. Cattle country. Miles and miles of Texas grassland framed by toothy mountains. We hit the dirt road. The rugged landscape became more unexpected by the mile. More spectacular. Wow.
One of the hardest things,in country like this, is chosing what I want to paint. How to zero in on one scene when there are millions out there, scenes that might work just as well. Sometimes it comes down to a single interesting plant, or a rock, or the way a cloud formation shadows a hill. Jim has a good eye for composition, and together, we pinpointed three "wow!" vistas along our route down into the canyon. We had time to be selective—sunset was still an hour away. We continued downhill, heading to the river (the Rio Grande and the Mexico border define one end of Pinto Canyon). I am perenially obsessed with what might lie around the next bend. In this case, more spectacular scenery. The choices got harder, not easier. (I took 650 digital pictures on this one excursion.)
We reached our go/no-go point before we reached the river road. The sun was low now. We had to either continue on and hope for a scene better than the ones we'd already selected, or U-turn and return to one of the chosen views in time for the spectacular light I anticipated. (At our crawling five miles an hour, this wasn't a decision we could postpone.) I decided not to get greedy. We'd follow the darkening road to the river road another day. I got out of our very long truck to direct Jim's dicey U-turn. As I frantically signaled "no further this way!!!" I realized that if any little thing went wrong, we'd spend the night straddling that one-lane road. We'd taken jackets, water, the usual desert survival supplies. We'd be okay, but I didn't want to miss that sunset vista. Skillfully, Jim turned, carefully balanced between a rock and a hard place to land, should he slip off that road. The dog and the parrot, our usual companions, relaxed as we headed uphill to get the shot I wanted.
We waited. Took more pictures. Waited. The last light painted Pinto Canyon and its Chinati Mountain. It was worth the wait.
"Sunset Paints Chinati" 60" x 40" pastel by Lindy C Severns copyright 2008
Featured at Kiowa Gallery, Alpine, TX
Alpine's ArtWalk and Gallery Night Nov 21 & 22 2008
SOLD
We stood there a minute, savoring the sense of falling into the infinite shadows of Chinati Mountain. Feeling small at the foot of magnificence. That's the feeling I tried to convey in this painting—an infinity of magnificence.
Man (nor artist) does not live by spirit alone. The sun abandoned us to our hunger. Jim sped down the the road we'd so leisurely driven hours before. We had our pictures, but we didn't have phone service. The Pizza Foundation would close soon. Our stomachs growled. I kept checking for phone service.
We made it back to Marfa in time to sit and eat pizza under the stars.
It was a good day. No, it was a magnificent day in a world bursting with magnificence.
I can't paint that. All I can do is marvel at it over pizza, then share my shadowy impression of what I know is really there.
Go to my website or Shop the studio store for greeting cards of this pastel
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