Abiquiu

Abiquiu

Oil on canvas, 10x10, $100

Last year, I painted in Abiquiu, NM, where Georgia O'Keeffe lived. (You pronounce it "Ah-bee-kyoo" - I asked). 

It's strange to paint in a place where a famous painter lived and painted. It would be like writing in Les Deux Magots, where Hemingway sat to write, or taking photographs of Half Dome in Yosemite, as Ansel Adams did. 

There's a part of me that rejoices in it, and hopes and believes and feels that the spirit of O'Keeffe will guide my eye and heart and hand. Then there's another part of me that's hopelessly aware that people might be looking at me thinking that I think I'm Georgia O'Keeffe. And that's the last thing I'd ever want. Do you know what I'm talking about? 

At any rate, I painted a year or so ago where O'Keeffe lived, and I took a lot of photos. This river, and the orange-red brush growing on its curving banks attracted me enormously. I couldn't find a safe place to pull in to paint, but I took a lot of photos, and enjoyed making this one. 

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Dog of the Day

I saw this dog in Oklahoma, guarding these two horses,

 and doing it pretty seriously, in spite of the fact that there was 

a barbed-wire fence, and really, no one around. 

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A final thought

"The world is what we think it is. 

If we can change our thoughts, we can change the world." 

- H.M. Tomlinson