Wednesday, June 05, 2013

Thunderheads Over Union Pass

June 5, 2013

   Still working on highway heatwaves:





The roadway is a bit better but the rippling effect that happens along the horizon is too overworked. My memory of highway heatwaves is of the entire horizon rippling like inching worms gone berserk. Needs more air in the distant landscape.

My father lived out his final years in So-Hi Estates, outside of Kingman, Arizona. We used to go up and visit him several times a year. It was very peaceful there and I remember looking out across Golden Valley and seeing Union Pass in the distance. This morning I whipped out this little study of that memory:

 
Daily Whipout, "Thunderheads Over Union Pass"

Cleaned in the garage again this morning and filled another big waste barrel with art and crap, mostly research paper. Did salvage a few things like this big board:





This dates from at least twenty years ago and portrays "The Carkid" (aka The 66 Kid) being charged in the basement of the Kingman Courthouse. I believe that's Sheriff Bill Porter, third from left, and Floyd Cisney on the right. Not sure who the guy at left is. The 66 Kid allegedly stole a top secret "car of the future" (The XS-5000) from Ford Proving Grounds at Yucca. The Kid was captured after a crazy chase. I think it was in the Valentine area where they finally got him. Quite a story and, as far as I know, never been told before.

I've been listening to a lot of road music lately, getting myself in the mood for my highway paintings, so I was kind of shocked to read this:

"The painter must make himself familiar with architecture before anything else. Never music, which is the enemy of painters and injurious to them."
—Salvador Dali, "Fifty Secrets of Magic Craftmanship"