DESERT

SIERRAS

PLACES

After moving to California, Lofton painted in Death Valley most springtimes, camping out in an old shed, driving around in an old Willy's jeep with a photographer friend. He painted entirely plein air and usually completed each painting in a day, standing out in the vast expanse wearing an old beat up hat. At that time, in the 1950s, Death Valley was a wilderness with a few dirt tracks and sun and wind scoured corrals and the occasional shed.

In late life, Lofton went to the Sierras to paint several times with a friend. There, he painted plein air, coffee thermos nearby, easel in the snow. In this vibrant series, he predominantly used cobalt, cerulean and ultramarine blues, cobalt violet, viridian, painting quickly with a palette knife.

OLD CORRAL, DEATH VALLEY

Richard Lofton painted primarily en plein air, traveling to the places he loved and found most fruitful. The lush Lowlands of South Carolina, where he grew up, the Big Sur coast of central California, Carmel-by-the-sea where he lived from 1945 until his demise, the Sierra Mountains, Death Valley, where he went yearly to camp and paint, Canyon de Chelly, Monument Valley and Mexico were places that called to him and where he spent much time painting. The work shown here is predominantly oil on linen, but he also worked in watercolor, pen and ink, ink and brush, charcoal, graphite, monotype and woodcut printing.

* Paintings that are available are marked with an asterisk.