Have you ever watched a thunderstorm roll across the Davis Mountains? There's mystery enough simply in wondering if it will drop much-needed rain on the high desert pastures beneath the rugged mountains. “Sunshine on Sawtooth’s Shoulders” is a small pastel landscape painting that captures that drama, along with the mesmerizing interplay of sunlight and shadow, a wild dance as rain-heavy clouds race over rolling, tumbling, rock-based golden grasslands. Meanwhile, content to stand peak-deep in shadow, Sawtooth Mountain anchors the southwestern end of the remote West Texas range like a loyal old friend.

I chose soft pastels for this piece because no other medium lets me chase the shifting light quite so directly. The hard and soft edges of the clouds, the bold ribbons of sunlight, the mysterious darkness of the craggy mountain—each stroke tells the story of a moody sky and willing land. Can you sense the descending darkness and hush before this storm? Feel that small jolt of happiness where the sun breaks through to light scattered patches of landscape? The interplay of light and shadow from clouds happens everywhere, but the Davis Mountains, irregular, rugged and still wild as a building thunderhead do the dance of light and shadow like nowhere else. "Where", one of my inquisitive students once asked as I began painting a demo Davis Mountains' landscape, "is the light coming from?" I laughed and said, "Anywhere it can slip through the clouds!"

My original artwork is presented under UV Protective, non-Reflective Museum Acrylic in a charcoal burled wood frame—rich, subtle, quietly elegant to echo the deep of the land and heavy clouds. The finished size is 13 inches by 11 inches; it's backed in acid-free paper, wired and ready to hang and shower West Texas drama and a large dose of serenity from your wall.