Items in: Art-Literature-Film

Items posted to this category relate primarily to creating, engaging, contemplating, and valuing creative cultural artifacts.

Bear Lake and Blue Lake are treasures to the Cuchara valley. Bear is a bit farther up the mountain, and its shoreline is irregular, with a few small inlets. This adds to its appeal as a place to go for quiet reflection and renewal: You can choose either an inlet’s more hidden places for greater solitude or the point of a peninsula to be more surrounded by the peaceful water. […]

Quiet Place with Bear

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
Bear Lake is a treasure to the valley, and a day spent with Bear offers space for reflection and renewal.
At Caprock Canyons State Park, the Texas State Bison Herd roams the park freely. I pitched my tent and walked the area. Thirty yards away, this large bull was resting in the bushes. Watching me. I just said, “Howdy, pardner,” and moseyed on back to camp. Among the trees and scattered greenery in this arid landscape, the bison is in its natural habitat. I am grateful that he shares it […]

Bison in the Bushes Behind my Tent

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
After setting up camp at Caprock Canyons State Park (Texas), I took a short walk into the brush and found this old boy, resting behind a mesquite tree. The bison roam free in this park.
Down from the area of Bear Lake, Blue Lake, and their surrounding ponds, Cucharas Creek flows down the Cuchara Valley to join forces with Cucharas River. Perhaps it’s a typical Colorado stream, yet bearing the name of its more prominent sister, and being sourced around the valley’s nearby lakes, it may stand a little taller and prouder. Certainly it sings as if it does – that laughing, rolling song that […]

Wild Cucharas Creek: Sun and Shade

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
Cucharas Creek flows down from Bear Lake and Blue Lake to join the Cucharas River about three miles up from Cuchara main street. I think it flows a little prouder for carrying the name of the valley.
While riding mountain bike trails by DeGray Lake in Arkansas USA, I thought to explore the area around it. I drove a long road around to Ozan Point. It was three days until camping would open for the season, so there was no one to disturb the sunset clouds’ reflection on the peaceful water. Thus was I treated to a serene lake reflecting a beautiful sky with clouds scattered to […]

Dusk at Ozan Point, DeGray Lake

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
Sometimes the solitude is a gift: It was three days before camping season opened that I visited Ozan Point on DeGray Lake in Arkansas. There was no one at the boat ramp or the dock, and the lake was a smooth mirror for the sunset clouds.
Among the mountains and waterfalls of Brazil’s oldest national park, Itatiaia, I rented a small house. As the sun set, the moon a waning crescent, I found on the lawn a small replica of Brazil’s most famous statue, Christ the Redeemer, mounted atop a large rock jutting from the ground. Jesus has open arms, silhouetted against a vibrant purple and orange twilight sky, with a sliver of the crescent moon […]

Christ the Redeemer, Sunset Silhouette

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
While visiting Brazil's oldest national park, Itatiaia, I came upon a replica of the Christ the Redeemer statue. Though it was but four or five inches tall, a bit of perspective makes Jesus a prominent part of one's life.
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Across Colorado, there are nearly 700 mountain peaks at 13,000 feet or higher elevation. Every one of these is a majestic focal point for someone’s camera. We are awed by their huge stature and the beauty of their power. And, surrounding every one of these peaks there are small plants that underpin the whole of the mountain’s ecosystem of flora and fauna. Without the foundation of such millions and millions […]

Roadside Warriors of the Valley

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
The huge mountain peaks are so easy to focus on. Their size and majesty give them great power to impose themselves on our hearts and psyches. Yet the beauty around and on a mountain peak is sustained by millions and millions of small warriors that underpin the mountain's ecosystem of flora and fauna.
Once long ago, a fiercely loyal resident of the Cuchara valley overheard someone refer to the Cucharas River as a creek. Sternly, the loyal resident informed the neophyte that it was indeed not a creek, but a river. Never mind arguments about physical size, the river punches above its weight in the spiritual realms of peace and beauty and centeredness. Winding its way from the south of the valley heading […]

The Mighty Cucharas

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
Do not be fooled by its size, the Cucharas River is much wider in hearts and minds of residents of the Cuchara valley. As has been said, "You can't see with your eyes if your imagination is out of focus."
On a patch of land, down a dirt road, around a hill, between two Colorado mountain towns, there is an old family graveyard that dates from the time of settlers moving to the west in North America. It’s not known how many are buried there, and only one of the graves is marked with a stone. Marking the whole of it is an old and worn wooden cross, adorned with […]

An Old Rugged Cross

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
In an old pioneer graveyard in Colorado, an old worn wooden cross watches over an unknown number of buried. The cross may well stand taller than the mountain behind it.
All along Croatia’s southern coast, by the Adriatic Sea, runs a ridge of mountain peaks. Just on the other side of that ridge, you can find little-used mountain roads, like this one that meanders through peaceful hills of lush greenery dotted with yellow and white flowering bushes. These roads connect small villages, farms, and orchards that seem as intimate and tranquil as they must have been a hundred years ago. […]

Croatia Mountain Road with Flowers

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
Croatia's Adriatic coast is beautiful, and just as much is the land just inland from the coastal mountain ridge. Small mountain roads surrounded by flowers and small towns are a lovely place for a drive.
Images & wall art by Life Love Illusion Personally signed limited editions, including a certificate of authenticity. Choose very small to very large, framed or unframed, canvas, brushed aluminum, paper and more:
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It is a rare day when the aurora borealis — the northern lights — are visible from Texas. But 2024 was near the top of the sun’s 11-year cycle, and it had days like that in May and October. In May, near Paris, Texas, the lights near sundown had a bit of green and mostly covered the northern half of the sky like a blanket. Then, toward midnight, the lights […]

Northern Lights, Texas #3: Midnight Rays near Paris

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
The year 2024 was near the top of the sun's 11-year cycle, so at times, the geomagnetic storms were strong enough to see the northern lights in Texas. That's what's behind these midnight rays, caught near Paris, Texas.
Colorado clouds are quite often astonishing, and a favorite of mine is when there are three or four distinct layers of clouds where each layer is a different type of cloud moving in a different direction. But in this case, there was only one layer, but it seemed to want to mirror and imitate the stepped shape of The Staircase (a dike wall). The rich blue sky above the cloud […]

Staircase in Cuchara Morning Sun

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
As the sun threw its light from the east, the clouds seemed to want to mirror and imitate The Staircase (a dike wall). The blue sky seemed to approve of the idea.
The change to winter may bring a sense of cold and melancholy, or it may take one’s heart and thoughts to the warmth of a hearth, a hug, and time spent together. This image, from the Sangre de Cristo mountains of Colorado, shows the slow onset of winter as ice grows on a small pond spaced between Bear Lake and Blue Lake. Image Information Limited Edition Availability Open Edition & […]

Winter Begins on Bear and Blue

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
Between Bear Lake and Blue Lake in Colorado's Sangre de Cristo mountains, a small pond shows the onset of winter in the growth of ice along its shoreline.
For the night sky photographer, small towns everywhere are a source of light pollution and potential frustration. That said, sometimes the glow of a town on the horizon adds a touch of life to an image or inspires a different way to see the light. On this occasion, I turned the though upside down, viewing all the lights in the sky — the stars, the Milky Way, Jupiter, the constellations […]

All the Lights of La Veta

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
The lights of La Veta, Colorado seem to extend up to and encompass the heavenly stars and planets...all the lights in the sky.
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When the sun rises across the eastern Colorado plains, it must struggle mightily to reach into the valleys of the western Colorado mountains. As it does, the light it casts may be cast as strangely saturated and glowing, especially if the clouds show up to reflect the light back. And those clouds sometimes allow some extra sleep to the mountains behind them. Here, Trinchera hides from us behind a cloud […]

Morning Sun, Trinchera Under Blanket

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
On a Colorado morning, the sun fights to shine into the valleys between the mountain peaks. Meanwhile, clouds may hide the tops of the mountains, as here, where Trinchera hides behind a pink blanket roll.
Certain characteristics establish the personality of a place. It may be dominance of a particular type of tree, or a particular mountain, or the types of roads, or any combination of many other features. This image aims to capture a set of things — in this case the West Spanish Peak, The Staircase (a so-called dike wall), an endemic evergreen tree, a local dirt road, a fence, skies…even burn scars […]

Icons of the Valley

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
A collection of features and things loved by the denizens of a place may capture a personality, as of a beloved friend. Here it is the West Spanish Peak, The Staircase (viewed end on), an endemic evergreen, and a local dirt road.
After the moon and a few well-known constellations, the Milky Way is perhaps one of the most talked about features of the night sky, and yet most cannot see it because of city lights. Away from the city, even when it appears only faint and blurry, you can hear the wonder in peoples’ voices. All the more do you hear wonder when someone sees what the camera can see: a […]

Milky Way over The Staircase

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
For most people, city lights block out a view of the Milky Way. But when they see it, even if it's only faint and blurry, you can hear the wonder in their voices.
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In the south of Iceland, black beaches are common, often stretching as far as you can see. Hiking among the high hills and cliffs that overlook the water, we came upon these four crisply defined bands of color — green hill, black beach, blue-teal sea, white sky — cut through by one of Iceland’s many rivers. The river’s sinuous path through the stark black sand raises the levels of contrast […]

Seashore Color Bands, Iceland

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
Black beaches are common in Iceland, and they provide a stark contrast with the land, sea, sky, and ocean. A river cutting through the sand adds another dimension.
In the Sangre de Cristo mountains of southern Colorado, clouds are a regular feature of beauty and majesty. On this particular frosty day, the clouds hung low, as a fog not far above the ground. The frozen branches and last vestiges of autumn color highlight the meadow. Look closely and you’ll find a lone black bird keeping watch. Image Information Limited Edition Availability Open Edition & Merchandise Availability

Frosted Cuchara Morning

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
In the Sangre de Cristo mountains of southern Colorado, clouds are a regular feature of beauty and majesty. On this particular frosty day, the clouds […]
In between two small towns in the Colorado mountains, there is a tiny family graveyard that dates from the time settlers moved into the western regions of North America. They found it well to mark the site with a rugged cross made from the materials of the day: horse harnesses and barbed wire. This image catches the cross at dusk, watched over by moon, a mountain, and a bright star. […]

Sacred Sunset

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
A tiny family graveyard dates from the time of the American west. A cross marks the place, marked with barbed wire, as a sunset moon and mountain look on.
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On a winter night in Little Rock, Arkansas, USA, I saw a large, orange full moon rising, low and bright. I rushed to a church that I knew had a view from a hill, arriving barely in time to catch the moon through tree branches, still orange. Lit artificially by spotlights trained on the church steeple, the branches stand out in high contrast, yet against the moon’s natural light, the […]

Full Orange Moon through Lit Branches

SHOP-BUY: Film & Photography
One winter night in Little Rock, an orange full moon shone bright and low. I rushed to a church I knew would have a good vantage point on the horizon.