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| Curve-billed thrasher |
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| Mockingbird |
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| Cooper's hawk nest |
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| Sam |
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| Odin |
Stepping a little closer to the window, I could glimpse paintings hanging inside the art gallery. I liked the montage effect of tree and shrub foliage outdoors superimposed on the artwork inside.
The paintings of David Conklin are currently on display in the Gallery at the Gardens until January 3, 2010. His work reflects southwestern scenes and wildlife. Here's a peek at some of the paintings inside:
To see more Weekend Reflection posts or to participate in this beautiful meme, visit James at Newtown Area Photo.
Sonora is a monumental steel sculpture which stands in front of the main library in the heart of downtown Tucson. Completed in 1991 by artist David Black, the piece is an example of proto-architecture that blends sculptural and architectural elements with abstract imagery from native cultures and the environment.
The pavilion-like roof and arches are designed for people to walk under and the curved benches are for sitting on.
Southwest Native American basket designs are found around the top of the structure.
The huge central ring of the sculpture rests on arrow-like columns.
Sonora also features abstractions of streams, wind and mountains from the desert landscape. The bright red color represents Tucson's mountains at sunset.
The sculpture reminds me of a dinosaur. It is a coincidence that the artwork is named Sonora because in 1995 the fossilized remains of a dinosaur were found in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona. The genus was named Sonorasaurus which means "Sonora lizard."
The top looks like a Hohokam basket filled with prickly pears and some other plants.
A saguaro harvest is taking place on the lower portion of this wall treatment.
Notice the similar shapes of the basket tower and the Native American figure on the tiles.
A saguaro cactus echos the shapes of the archways in the superior court building.
A purple saguaro bus stop shelter:
This was my favorite bus stop:
At first I thought the big flower was a cactus blossom, but the trailing vines and leaves look like they belong to the rose family.
The flower's filaments are twisted steel rebar. I liked their shadows.
Another giant metal flowering plant sprouts out from the ground beside a sidewalk:
More plant forms on walls of buildings:
The artwork below is hard to see because of the busy reflection. The window has a wrought iron saguaro cactus with a bird and a human figure. It's across the street from the Chicago Store on Congress Street.
I'm kind of curious how the muscle man relates to the cactus here. Looks like they might be saying, "cheers!"
Rumor has it that this creature is a reincarnation of one of four griffins that once guarded the nearby 1901 Carnegie Library on 6th Avenue.
As the story goes, in 1941 when the library was burning down, one griffin fled by foot. The old library building is now the Tucson Children's Museum. Today, one can follow griffin footprints embedded in the pavement from the children's museum to the new griffin sculpture.
Part of the Scott Avenue revitalization project unveiled in May, the steel griffin sculpture by local artist Joe O'Connell can be found on Scott Avenue at Corral Street. If you're anywhere in the vicinity, you can't miss it. It's big...it's orange...and it sparkles in the sunlight!
And after dark, red lights on the griffin's ribcage light up its raised wings.
I've done many Skywatch Friday posts before, but this is my first My World Tuesday entry.
The roads downtown were closed to traffic for a while, even to cyclists.
The Tucson Meet Yourself festival was also taking place while we were downtown.
And, I was like a kid in a candy store snapping pictures left and right of art and architecture.
We've been to several running events this year with our middle son. Our oldest son likes to go to a social walk/run downtown on Monday evenings called Meet Me at Maynards. Next month is the annual 109 mile El Tour de Tucson bike race which starts and ends downtown. None of our boys have participated in the bike race, but we still like to watch it.
