Sunset, Sunday, 21 June 2009

Locust Dale, Madison County, Va. Oil on paper, 16 x 20.

Our destination (see previous post) offered an amazing vista, with Old Rag about smack in the center. This of course is a much longer view than the one in the painting from early afternoon – these mountains are around three times higher than those on our eastern horizon.

A friend I’d worked with in L.A. and then lost touch with decided to build a house in Virginia; I rediscovered him living one mile down the road from me. When he first got here he made a common westerner’s mistake and called the Blue Ridge mere “hills” – no doubt because, on the horizon, they bear a superficial resemblance to the Santa Monica Mountains, or, as they’re known in one section, the Hollywood Hills. 

Once you get up there, in the Blue Ridge, you realize you’re in a seriously massive territory all its own.

Twelve years ago, Laura and I traveled to the wonderful city of Montréal for our honeymoon. We had no idea that June 21st was also the anniversary of the hanging of Marie-Joseph Angélique, a Portuguese-born African slave convicted – on shaky evidence – of deliberately starting a fire that burned much of the city in 1734.

If you go to the linked article, I can save you a little time by noting that the research controversies mentioned at the beginning don’t have much to do with the major facts of the case. Also, I don’t always mean to refer people to Wikipedia, but sometimes that’s a natural place to start. Encyclopedia Britannica, for example, is available only by subscription – I subscribe for the sake of my research for editorial clients – and, in any case, seems too conservative or hidebound to include many subjects like the unfortunate Angélique.

Come to think of it, I have a literally hidebound set of Britannica on my shelf, and she’s not in there, either.

Early Afternoon, Summer Solstice 2009

Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on paper, 16 x 20.

Laura and I will be out tonight celebrating our twelfth anniversary, and the chances that tonight’s sunset will be painted or posted tonight are exactly zero. It’ll be up tomorrow. If you’re out to dinner tonight in Locust Dale, Virginia, at a place that styles itself as the Inn at Meander Plantation, I’m the guy stepping away from the table at about 8:30 and going outside with a pencil and pad in my hand.

Since I’m not going to be broadcasting on this frequency tonight, I thought I’d try to leave a little something from the day – this was painted between 1:30 and 2:00, almost exactly 12 hours after the solstice. The view is in almost the opposite direction of the sunset, southeast, toward the Southwest Mountains.

It’s a near-perfect summer day, much like 12 years ago, except that day was hotter, over 90, and there was no A/C – no electricity – in the little St. James Chapel (Garth Chapel) on Garth Road. Our first dance, at the reception at White Hall Vineyards, was to a recording we had made of ourselves singing “Memories Are Made Of This” – and, as you can see, so they are.