first Aspen Series

I was back in NY and I was finishing paintings I started before. A series of Black and White Lagoon paintings I started in 1997. Also the Madrid paintings were not complete, I brought these all from NM to complete now back in the NY Studio. At that point the large garage I used in NM was not substantial enough to lend a similar quality to the paintings. I used to say that the solidity of NY walls were different than the sheet rock of suburbia.




I was painting up a storm and went right into a new series of Aspen paintings from the abundant sources I now had since teaching at Anderson Ranch in Aspen.

Here my new cycle became clear. I started with the plein air. Blew up parts that struck me and they were around the studio for a bit.




I started then a b/w group. These were all piled around the studio.

I went to the Tibet House Benefit at Carnegie Hall and as the Monks chanted and their trumpets blared, I saw a Big Orange Square covering my Mountain painting. Here one might wonder what it was hiding and there is that covering aspect but more I saw it as a heightening. Anyway a meditation perhaps on the two aspects.





The Squares seem to come naturally or not at all. I soon had a nice range of heightened and deepened spaces.

I saw the whole cycle very clearly. This was 2003.