Butterfly Magnolia Blossom, Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Gardens, March 13, 2011

White Tail Deer, Shenandoah National Park, Virginia May 12, 2009

Art on Sunday #6

Swannanoa/Swannanoa II, Painted and chromium-plated steel with wood and metal base, 1959/1974, John Chamberlain, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, August 1, 2015

Assembled from crushed car parts, Swannanoa/Swannanoa II seems to open its wings in whirling movement. In its free-flowing style and large scale, the sculpture shows the influence of the expressive, abstract paintings John Chamberlain saw in New York, similar to the paintings in this gallery. His ongoing exploration of incorporating unusual “found” materials into his work extended beyond car parts: he also used steel, paper bags, and foam rubber in his sculpture. Chamberlain loved expressive titles that sometimes referenced his life. This title refers to the Swannanoa River near Asheville, North Carolina, which flows near Black Mountain College. In 1955 and ‘56, Chamberlain attended Black Mountain, where he met a group of similarly inspired artists and poets. (Crystal Bridges)

Born in Rochester, Indiana as the son of a saloonkeeper, John Chamberlain was raised mostly by his grandmother after his parents divorced. He spent much of his youth in Chicago. After serving in the U.S Navy from 1943 to 1946, he attended the Art Institute of Chicago (1951–52) and Black Mountain College (1955–56). At Black Mountain, he studied with the poets Charles Olsen, Robert Creeley, and Robert Duncan, who were teaching there that semester. The following year, he moved to New York, where for the first time he created sculpture that included scrap-metal auto parts. Over the course of his prolific career, he had studios in New York, New Mexico, Florida, Connecticut, and finally Shelter Island. (Wikipedia)

I adjusted depth of field and color of the background for this image to make the sculpture stand out from its surrounding – Mike.

Seven Hollows Trail
Petit Jean State Park, Arkansas

Blast from the Past blog post — moved from August 9, 2009 to here.

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Petit Jean State Park and Petit Jean Mountain images

Petit Jean State Park and Petit Jean Mountain information

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Haw Creek galleries

Artillery battery in casemate; Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, June 14, 2012

Elk herd, Moraine Park meadow, Rocky Mountain National Park, August 31, 2009

Tansy Aster next to ruin wall, Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado, September 14, 2009

Tugboat pushing barges up river; view from Big Dam Bridge – Pulaski County Pedestrian & Bicycle Bridge – Murray Lock and Dam on the Arkansas River May 12, 2007

Prickly Poppy, Windlass Hill on the Oregon Trail, near Ash Hollow, Nebraska, July 8, 2010

Argemone albiflora (Wikipedia)

Argemone albiflora, the white prickly poppy, also known as the bluestem prickly poppy or the Texas prickly poppy, is a small erect plant with a decorative white flower with a yellow latex. It is deeply rooted with yellow or red stamens. The plant is known for the sharp prickles on its stem and leaves. The sepals fall off as the flower of this plant grows bigger. It grows in the arid regions of the southern Midwest along roadsides and disturbed pieces of land. Native Americans have long revered this plant for its medicinal and other uses.