La Via del Hombre Blanco
Larry Bell
Created : 1991
Purchased : 1991
Medium : Mixed Media/two-dimensional
Dimensions: 70 inx89.5 in
Located: 2nd Floor,Senate Gallery West Entrance
Via del Hombre Blanco (1991)
Mixed media on canvas
Larry Bell (b. 1939)
Taos
Capitol Art Selection Committee Purchase
Capitol Art Collection, Capitol Art Foundation
When Larry Bell moved from Southern California to Taos in 1973, his art continued to reflect his concern with the ephemeral qualities of color and light. Known internationally for his intuitive use of sophisticated aerospace technology, Bell creates elusive artworks filled with magic and mystery, using “light on surface” as his medium as well as his subject.
Via del Hombre Blanco is a collage. It is a constructed, two-dimensional image made from approximately 30 layers of paper, mylar, and laminate film, each coated with various thicknesses of vaporized metals and a nonmetallic material similar to quartz. There is no pigment in the imagery. The colors are what are known as interference colors (similar to the rainbow colors seen in a puddle of water in a filling station). Light reflecting off the metal coating is interfered with by the quartz layer of material at wavelengths in the spectrum that are equal to the thickness of the coating of the surface. The coating process allows Bell to control the way light interferes with surface. The resulting coloration in the artwork is created by trapped light of varying wavelengths reflected from the surfaces as varying hues. Bell explains: “It’s just light making these colors, not pigment or chemicals.” The result is luminous and radiant.
To create this artwork, Bell coated the materials improvisationally, then rotated them on the canvas until the architectural elements inscribed on the surface of each sheet related in some visual fashion to the layers below. The image was then fused to the canvas in a laminating press. The final surface of the imagery is textured to break up and disperse the light off the surface.
In 1990, Bell received the Governor’s Award for Excellence and Achievement in the Arts. Speaking of his work at that time, Bell said, “Art is an openness to searching, a willingness to keep trying to stretch your world view.”
It continues to be the goal of the Capitol Art Foundation to build a permanent collection of New Mexican master artworks that reflects New Mexico’s rich and diverse cultural and artistic traditions.
