Nature Portfolio: In the Artist's Backyard

In The Artist's Backyard

When I was a child growing up in a rural environment, my thoughts of making pictures mingled freely with naive studies of nature. I busied myself with collecting bugs, catching crawdads, and raising frogs in a jar next to my bed. At quiet times, I pored over picture books on nature subjects and copied the illustrations. Now, like other adults who so often revert to the interests of their youth, I still find myself collecting bugs and watching for lizards, while my efforts as a painter continue to be stimulated by the fascinating details and relationships of the natural world. As a professional wildlife artist, my work has taken me to many exotic places, including Africa and South America. Yet the farther afield I traveled, the more I longed to paint the familiar surroundings at home in Payson, Arizona. Near my house is a large meadow with a pond. There are oak trees along its banks, and a hundred-year-old barn sits at one corner of the field. Bass fishing here is good, especially in April when the big ones surface after a cold winter. The meadow was formed centuries ago by beavers that once inhabited our little valley. Every autumn, flocks of Canada geese take up winter residence on this postage-stamp segment of rural America. With the arrival of warmer days, the geese depart and are replaced by mourning doves and meadowlarks. Despite the stillchilly nights, the pond regains a fresh look with the rapid growth of reeds along its borders. The fish begin to rise at dawn. Many species of animals live out their lives in and around the meadow. Raccoons are the most prominent as they skirt the water's edge searching for food. An old oak provides them an ideal lookout over the pond. An occasional red fox can be seen swiftly passing through, looking for the field mice that feed on the new meadow grass. Cottontail rabbits raise their young beneath the fallen logs littering the south end of the meadow. In central Arizona, seasonal change can be dramatic. But spring is by far my favorite time, usually encroaching early on the mild winter and coaxing me out of my studio. Always it is the charm of the meadow that lures me on these balmy days. With sketchbook under my arm, I spend hours walking the fringes of the meadow, watching for migratory birds and smelling the fresh spring air.

In The Artist's Backyard

Payson artist Nicholas Wilson came to Arizona in 1970. He developed his interest in painting Southwestern wildlife while working as curator of exhibits at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. His paintings are exhibited at Trailside Galleries in Scottsdale, Arizona, and Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and (as of October 29, 1988) at Venture Gallery, Tucson.