For many years I’ve pined to unite my background in environmental science with painting in a more formal way than I have previously been able to do. The vulnerability of natural resources has always been my driving force, my “why” for creating artwork. So when BMoCA approached me to create a body of work to show with them I knew this was my chance.

With the support of the museum director David Dadone and guidance from the curator Jane Burke, I settled on the Colorado River as the topic for the work. It seemed an apt muse given (1) the maze of environmental and socio-political issues surrounding the river and the use of it's water over the last century, (2) the beauty and diversity of the landscapes it carves through on its 1450 mile journey, and (3) the depth of my personal relationship with it as a consumer of its bounty. 

And so for the past 7+ months I've been researching, writing and painting to this end. I've created close to 50 new artworks (24 paintings on panel and ~25 sketchbook studies) and a body of poetry to interpret the visual pieces that focus on 7 key locations along the river’s path. My goal was to examine some of the key issues surrounding the use of river water in modern society while highlighting the beauty offered by the slow, tedious work of carving performed by the river over the ages.

Artist Chelsea Kaiah is also contributing work to the show.

How to see the work:

• Opening Reception: Thurs, May 23. 6-8pm

• Artist tour & talk with hydrologist Natalie Collar, PhD and water policy expert Rachel Pittinger: Friday, June 20. 6-730pm

The exhibition runs from May 23 - Sept 02, 2024 and may be visited by walk-in or appointment during regular museum hours:

Tuesday–Sunday: 11am - 5pm
Closed Mondays

Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art

1750 13th St.

Boulder, CO 80302

(303) 443 - 2122

Sketchbook Studies

Site #1 : The Green River (WY)

Northwesterly of the official headwaters of the Colorado River
her tributaries spout and gurgle 
through the Flaming Gorge
aptly named by Powell, the explorer who 
christened the chasm so 
for “the brilliant, flaming red of its rocks [when the sun shone upon them]”. 
In that year 1869 and all before it
the sublimity of those arenas required
the hard work of one’s own strength and daring to witness
what today we politely observe 
through the tempered glass of our transports.
These upper waters wend through mining country,
the great trona beds of Sweetwater
left to sweat by the ancient Lake Gosiute for a time
now erupting reluctantly from the ground
under the forceful hands of men
the river’s young waters enslaved in the task
of washing ore day after day
are a veal calf,
siphoned away still bleating 
to sate the thirsty bones
of townships on the verge of becoming ghosts.
The river is born, lives, and dies
a worker
indentured servant of the 40 million cottonmouths
until 1450 miles downstream
where early she will meet the death crone in the Mexican delta sands
wishing only to greet the Sea of Cortez.

Site #2 : Colorado Headwaters

Site #3: Glenwood Canyon

There’s a jewel box high in the mountains
left hanging there like the last ornament on the tree.
Fringed with curtains of Columbine and Bog Orchid,
it can’t contain the glinting collection of emeralds
that seep slowly from the travertine into the Colorado below.
A dead horse marked the gulchway up from the river
at least according to the lore
decrepit totem to the travelers beneath, beckoning
come, come and see!
Year after year I drive the careening passages through Glenwood
always noting the byzantine zag of the rocks
a violent portrait of the carver working dutifully
on these layered walls
aided now and then by a fire
that sharpens the artist’s blade with the sediment of the burn
sliding away all night
to the consternation of Lake Powell, its heiress.
At the foot of this cleavage
river waters mingle with those from the Yampah springs 
Big Medicine as the Ute called it,
pooling genially into folds hollowed out by long-dead hands
thrusting upwards into the spark-spray of the Grand Fountain.
Last time I was there
my daughter soaked quietly in my belly
jelly-like, unformed yet.
She, like the canyon,
is of the water
I reckon

Site #4: Canyonlands / Moab (UT)

I sit in my studio and look at my hands as they move across the panel
they look more like my mothers now than they used to
and soon, like her mother’s before her.
When I stared over the great expanse above Dead Horse Point last fall
feeling the stir of my heart in the evening winds
I remember thinking the land looked like my grandmother’s skin
when my child hands pushed together on either side of her wrist
the folds neverending.
How many times the waters
had a change of heart
coursing through this valley through the eons
some of her edifices
like the the Titan of Fisher Towers
standing in high relief against the desert sky
are just the carcasses of a plateau 
carried away in the current
others, like the right-angled structures built by men
are just enabled by the shunting of her waters.
My eyes scan the Canyonlands and catch in the corner
an ancient monument indeed
the Paradox Formation
coaxed to the surface and evaporated into crystalline form
through a slurry of river water dyed electric blue
The Moab Potash Ponds: a resurrection of ocean
that old, old poultice of salts
seems more alien on this surface 
than the others.
Imagine if our heartbreaks were so thoroughly mapped? 
I suppose that is what our wrinkles are
if we are lucky enough to grow old
and earn so many

Site #5: Lake Powell / Glen Canyon Dam

Before the flood
the canyon was Eden
fleeced with arches and other intricately sculpted formations.
A drawn out fight led by the Sierra Club
was lost as the Colorado’s waters began to steep 
behind the new walls of Glen Canyon Dam
to form Lake Powell, 
defender of the West against drought and ruin;
the dark backdrop of war in Vietnam casting the 
heroic feat of engineering in a dazzling light.
Now the spring breakers peel across the gathered hems of her surface
beholding her as the May Queen -
emblem of abundance and leisure
bearer of fruits to the irrigated croplands that burst forth 
from her fingertips 
and oh, how the people of St. George must have danced
when first the siphoned water reached them!
But the lake is a bell tower
and her warnings ring clear
“This bounty is fickle!”, moans the bells.
As I stand on the precipice
there hangs above me a great, blackened orb
the aft sphere
bending the light of the midday sun
around its mass.
The orb is, i think, the weight of the water
of what it buried
and of what the bleached shoreline too, foretells:
there is no Amphritite here
no wise overseer
there is only us,
and our dreams.

Site #6: The Grand Canyon

A once-lonely river
bustles with the noise and confusion of a holiday
as bodies line the seams of this great rip in the Earth.
I get the sense that the crowd is allied in collective pursuit 
of enlightenment
we stand shoulder to shoulder 
peering down and across the ripples that fade to dust-blue in the distance
How can my little eyes take all of this in?
so much has happened in the 70 million years
since your dissection began.
The water roars more loudly here
a noticeable quickening in the womb of rock
I spent 21 days down in that lion’s den
a decade ago
and my heart became a hole
that my body drained out of.
Here it is still the morning of creation
and the gaping sky
recedes through the curtain of walls with each passing day
on the broiling tongue 
of the river.
Where the Little enters the canyon
the marriage of waters is consummated 
at a holy site.
A well of souls
watches helplessly from the ages
as our wreckless hands conspire 
to ferry hoards upon the precious shores from which
they would peer greedily at the wedding bed.
The plan is hushed, for now.

Site #7: Lake Mead / Hoover Dam

She’s seriously overdrawn,
the greatest reservoir in the country
straws reaching far past her sternum
to poke at the dregs.
Last time I saw her before this I was in a raft, dragged behind a motorboat
the slack current of the upper Mead leaving us reliant on an outboard motor
to cross her.
I was sick and I begged the group to pull onto the reedy shore 
so I could find a rock to puke behind
Was she low then, too?
now I fret with my camera
searching for an angle from which to shoot the peak-like hydroelectric towers 
that turn water into wine at all hours of the day and night.
The river slumbers here in the breathing, spidery lake above Hoover
for a couple of years
gathering strength for the toil that lies beyond;
it will be hard work to feed the great southwestern cities of Los Angeles, San Diego, Tucson
and that dragon, Las Vegas-
a mirage of drenched opulence that feels adversarial as dead pool looms on the horizon
but the valley stays within its means
drawing from an ancient aquifer 
far beneath the thrumming hive
and employing clever tricks, like the magicians of the strip
to make their rations last..
There is much to learn from the oasis.
Home beckons
it is from here that I say goodbye to the river
as i’ve done before, and I’ll do again.
We turn from each other and continue our journeys
mine east, back to the mountains
hers west, towards the sea.

Recent Press about “Tracking Time”

Channel 9 News | Boulder Lifestyle Magazine | Daria Magazine | Yellow Scene Magazine | North American Museum Association

Thanks to Anne Herbst with 9 News for this feature!