Sleightholm Folk Art

This year I fell in love….with Santa Fe and New Mexico. I was so fortunate to get to explore the city with my mom and my daughter in the springtime, and this fall- to celebrate our coming 20th anniversary- my husband and I decided to drive there for a long weekend. From my front door, Santa Fe is 9 hours and a world away. It’s beautiful desert landscape, rich history, Catholic and indigenous folk art, all speak to my heart. I come away from the Sangre De Cristo Mountains yearning to paint and pining for the desert. Ironically, up in an elevation over 7,000 about sea level, Santa Fe is much more temperate than my sweltering prairie home where we still have heat, flies and mosquitos. I dream now of chilly desert nights and mornings with coffee looking out over the rabbit brush!

When I returned home from our trip, I had a little more painting to do for my 2025 calendar (it’s coming! I promise!) and I needed a piece for November, a notoriously hard month to select art for. Then it came to me- Dia de los Muertos- Santa Fe style! And so here it is, my latest painting inspired by Catholic culture in New Mexico, with the mountains in the distance and a bright Aspen tree near the patio. It’s called “The Ofrenda”, inspired by the altars set up in some Mexican homes to honor loved ones who have passed. This tradition extends beyond Mexico into the American southwest, and even beyond Hispanic culture, as many people- especially fellow Catholics- have adopted this tradition. I put a lot of tiny detail in this piece, and hope you like it! I It has old family photos, marigolds, a sugar skull, candles and the family’s ancestor’s favorite foods and drinks. I will of course have prints, but the original painting is also for sale in my Etsy shop!

The southwest may not be the first place you think of when you think of autumn (I for many years thought mainly of New England!) but it’s a delightful place to be this time of year! There was a lot of funky pottery- I brought home a painted pottery jack o lantern! The colors of the landscape seemed to deepen, the pinon pines were offering their precious pine nuts (we saw people often on the side of the road harvesting them! I took some pinon pinecones home with me for the memory!)

I know these desert inspired paintings are probably just the beginning of many pieces like this, and hopefully I’ll be able to visit Santa Fe more as the years go by. What a blessing to be able to see it twice in one year, after so many years of talking about traveling there. I am so grateful for the wonderful memories made, and the inspiration for my brushes! Thank you for all of it, Santa Fe!

And thank you for stopping by! I’ll be back soon with more…

Take Joy!
H