For Grant Redden’s newest show at Maxwell Alexander Gallery in Pasadena, California, the artist will be focusing on the beauty around his home in Wyoming, where the seasons tend to get more pronounced above 7,000 feet. It’s even called High Desert Plateauto draw attention to that high country he enjoys painting.
On an Old High Country Trail, oil, 16 x 16 in.
But another element looms large in the show: struggle. This theme is reflected in works like Twisting in the Wind and Upended, both of which show a rider fighting with a quarrelsome horse. “The Western way of life is all about the struggle to stay alive,” says Redden. “These paintings are based on things I’ve witnessed or had happen to me. I haven’t been bucked off a horse since I was a little kid, and that’s for the best, but all of life isn’t like that. There are peaceful times and then there are times of crisis where you either survive or don’t.”
Upended, oil, 16 x 20 in.
High Desert Plateau, which opens June 7, will have works showing the peaceful times and periods of struggle. Both play prominent roles in Redden’s studio. In all of the works, the horse and rider are the stars, no matter the setting, mood or narrative. They are frequently painted loosely and yet have an exceptional amount of detail—calling cards for the artist. Redden is a master at laying the paint down and his work draws comparison to the paint handling of Frank Tenney Johnson.
Twisting in the Wind, oil, 16 x 20 in.
Among the new works is Through the Aspen, which shows a rider leading a lost sheep through a magnificent setting. Redden has a long personal and family history with sheep, and the subjects turn up frequently in his work. In Through the Aspen, he conveys the idea of a stray animal. Many paintings in Western art focus on lost cattle, but here it’s a stray sheep. “Cows generally like to stay lost, but sheep usually don’t. They wish they probably weren’t lost because that’s when they’re most vulnerable to the coyotes and whatnot. They also like to bed down together, whereas cows do hang out together but quickly will decide they want to be back in the brush sometimes,” Redden says. “That painting is my life right there, or I guess my old life. That grove of aspens is right up behind my house. I pulled the horse and the sheep from a photo reference and memory and put them in there. I remember pushing sheep through those aspens in the summer and fall and there was always so much beauty there. Aspens are a great subject for paintings because they can be very reflective with light...”
Through the Aspen, oil, 20 x 22 in.
Redden adds, “These subjects are important to me, but what interests me most is just putting the paint on the surface and seeing what I can create with it.” —
Maxwell Alexander Gallery 1300 N. Lake Avenue » Pasadena, CA 91104 » (213) 275-1060 » www.maxwellalexandergallery.com
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