Painting at Steve's Arizona - Mittry, Cibola and Alamo Lakes

I was happy to paint while Steve was sharing his favorite Arizona fishing holes with my husband. I didn't know if I could paint on a trip designed primarily for fishing. I wasn't sure I wanted to come on this trip at all. But I enjoyed painting where Steve fishes every winter for 25 years. As it turned out camping in the wilds in our Winnebago was excellent inspiration. I can put emotion and life into a painting if I am totally living in the space where I paint. Painting 6 feet from our Winnibago's door

at first camp at Mittry Lake.

In the background is Steve and his pontoon boat.

Camping on BLM lands near Cibola Lake.

At Mittry Lake and Cibola Lake Painting flowed during and after March trip

Painting at Red Cliff State Park before meeting up with Steve and his wife at Mittry Lake the first week of March.

The main purpose of this blog is to show the way my paintings developed in chronalogical order. RVing and painting is working out for me. I also sell. To see prices look at the column on the right and click on "Willing to Sell".

Red Cliff State Park, California

Moleskin pocket book sketch done on location.

"Red Cliffs"

watercolor on 300 Lb. Killamonjaro cotton rag paper, 19" x 14"

Done in camp after sketching on location.

First Stay at Mittry Lake

" Changing Chair at the Put-in for the Pontoon Boat"

Watercolor on Kilimanjaro 140 Lb cold press cotton rag paper

13" x 9" Not Available

"Facing the Setting Sun at Mittry First Camp"

Watercolor and acrylic on 140 Lb. Kilimanjaro paper

11" x 15"

"Reeds in Front of our Winnebago"

Watercolor and acrylic

on cold press 140 Lb. cotton rag Kilimanjaro paper

11" x 15"

Three Miles dirt from Exit 52, HWY 8 to Tucson

"Saguaro Once Thrived Near exit 52 E"

Watercolor on hot press Arches, 9" x 12"

"Jagged Mountains Comb Cloudy Locks "

available after January 4

Acrylic on museum wrapped canvas, 16" x 20"

Second Stay at Mittry Lake and One Time at Cibola

"Coots on Mittry Lake"

Watercolor on 140 Lb. Killamonjaro cotton rag paper, 14' x 20"

This painting was begun on our first stay and completed on our second stay.

For sale $400

"Sunshine on the Reeds at Mittry Lake"
Not available

"Mittry Lake's Sprouting Reeds"

Not Available

"Calm Before the Storm Mittry Lake"

Not Available

On the second stay at Mittery Lake I did many paintings of the reeds which were an important step to doing some interpretative works later on at home. The above three are all watercolors on 140 Lb. hot press cotton rag Arches paper 9" x 12".



"Picacho Peak Wilderness"

Painted at Cibola is a memory of our drive from Mittery to Cibola.

Watercolor on Arches, 19" x 14"
For Sale $200

"Wild Flowers at Cebolia"Acrylic on canvas, 16" x 20" This painting has been developed further and is not available until after March

"Moon rise near Cibola"

Watercolor on cold press Arches, 19" x 14"
For Sale $200

Paintings Completed at Alamo State Park

"Emerging from Depths of Alamo Lake" is a watercolor on 140 Lb. cotton rag Arches paper, 14" x 21". Not Available

"Steve Fishing at Alamo Lake" is watercolor on 140 Lb. arches cotton rag paper, 14" x 20". The reservoir here is only 17% full and the falling water level is making a terraced waterline and revealing previously drowned cotton wood trees. Not Available

"Alamo Sunset" is watercolor on two ply cotton rag museum board, 21 x15". The watercolors all soak in like rice paper.

Rainbow Vista Trail, Canyon of Fire State Park, Nevada

"Rainbow Vista Trail" is a watercolor on hot pressed 140 Lb. cotton rag paper, 9" x 13 1/2". This is the last painting completed on the trip. It was lightly penciled in on the trail and finished later the same day in camp.

Giants in the Rock, Canyon of Fire State Park, Nevada

"Giants in the Rocks" is watercolor and thinned acrylic medium over a textured absorbent ground on hardboard 7" x 5" x 3/4". The cradled board makes a box ready to hang, no frame necessary. This painting was started with watercolors near the end of the day in our camp site.

"Reed Dragon, the Protector"

" Reed Dragon, the Protector" is acrylic on canvas, 16" x 20". The painting on top is the beginning as painted on location. At home I wished to abstract from the painting and my memories. A friend thought the reeds looked like a spiked finned fish. Sometimes dragons take the form of carp but I felt how protective the reeds were to the nesting birds and how the reeds provided shade to the fish. At home the fish became more dragon-like.

Abstracted from memory and poetry

"Primal Pebble"

I picked up a cool pebble at our Cebolia camp.

If she could see and speak, she could tell us an epic story.

Rounded and polished in the Colorado's ancient glacial floods,

then her skin was blackened by air and sunlight.

The shinny black conceals a heart of hot iron colors from a fiery birth.

Ages ago big sister rocks were visited by native hunters

who carved through her blackened skin to warm life colors.

Prayerfully on the rocks imaging their memories, maps and dreams the hunters made the blackened rock a character in our history.

"Primal Pebble" is acrylic on stretched canvas, 48" x 24"

"Fleeing Home" is an abstraction from my memories of driving past the Walker Indian Reservation, Nevada. It is acrylic on stretched canvas, 24" x 48".

"Reed Sunset" is an acrylic painting on Museum wrapped canvas 24" x 36" x 1 1/2". Reed unset is a memory painting from doing many preliminary watercolors on location and bringing home momentous. As I painted it I was interested in abstracting the essence of the sunset experienced in our Winnebago parked right out by the water's edge with reeds on either side of us. Because we were dry camping without electrical hook up we sat in the dark motor coach looking at the last glow of sunset through the reeds. We listened to the birds nesting in the reeds.

Orange Moon Rise at Alamo State Park

"Orange Moon Rise" is watercolor on hot press Arches 140 Lb. cotton rag paper. This was started on location but I wanted to make it more like my memory, impression and feelings. At home I continued to put layer upon layer of paint to build up a glow.

Confessions

I reworked this one over and over until I got this on April 20th. Now was all the agonizing over it worth while? I broke my rule. I do better to start new paintings. Well I do like the way the landscape rolls in a natural way after all the changes. The initial spontaneous urge is still there?

" "Cibola Wildflowers" is 16" x 20" acrylic on canvas.

I have broken my promise to keep my work fresh and not go back into it unless I am using it as a springboard to something new. I had an idea I wanted pretty flowers so even though people liked the "Wild flowers at Cibola", I felt it could be richer and I wanted to see more transition in the colors so I corrected this painting long after my first response that should be the best spontaneous painting. Yesterday I posted a new revision and today I deleted it and have made more basic changes. I am glad I did even though I liked it in the first photograph I took of it with my easel set up in location. The paint was all dripping down and the flowers were not in the painting yet.

I am happy that rules can be broken even the ones made by me for me.

Willing to Sell

Below is a list of the paintings shown in this blog gallery and their price. To these I'll add a fee for the postage. If you wish to buy please e-mail me at dondianewenzel@msn.com

Red Cliffs $100
Put In Changing Chair for Pontoon Boat $70
Facing the Setting Sun at Mittry Lake First Camp $70
Reeds in Front of Our Winnebago $70
Saguaro Once Thrived Near Exit 52 E $70
Jagged Mountains Comb Cloudy Locks $300
Coots on Mittery Lake $300
Sunshine on the Reeds at Mittry Lake $80
Mittery Lake's Sprouting Reeds $80
Calm Before the Storm, Mittry Lake $80
Piacho Peak Wilderness $150
Wild Flowers at Cibola $300
Moon Rise near Cibola $100
Emerging from the Depths of Alamo Lake $100
Steve Fishing at Alamo Lake $100
Alamo Sunset $150
Rainbow Vista Trail $150
Giants in the Rocks $99
Reed Dragon the Protector $350
Primal Pebble $500
Fleeing Home $500
Reed Sunset $500
Orange Moon Rise $99

My Early Arizona Painting

Tucson Brickworks on long term loan to "Rain'

Watercolor

"Patagonia, Arizona Morning"

in the collection of blogger "Rain"

3' x 5'

Going back to Arizona to paint is sweet because I had such a good time painting there in the 60's.

To see more of my Arizona paintings

in "Rain's " blog on April 14, http://rainydaythought.blogspot.com