A late-summer view of the Milky Way in juxtaposition with Ricardo Breceda’s giant sculpture of a Woolly Mammoth. The glow along the bottom of the photo is a distant San Diego.
Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. Borrego Springs, California.
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The desert sculptures of Ricardo Breceda
Southern California artist Ricardo Breceda created and installed over 130 huge fanciful sculptures across the Borrego Springs, California desert landscape, each made of rugged iron and steel.
With a temperature of over 105 degrees outside, we only had the stamina to get out of the car and photograph a few of Breceda’s works. One of my favorites was this 350-foot long serpent, which undulates up then under the nearby road.
Dennis Avery (heir to the Avery label fortune) commissioned Breceda to create each of the sculptures. Avery eventually donated most of the land to California, becoming part of the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, and set-up a trust fund to maintain the works after his death in 2012.
Breceda is still alive and continues to make sculptures from his studio near Temecula.
In the Morning at Font’s Point
The Sun rises over the Borrego Badlands
Here’s my follow-up photo of the Borrego Badlands taken a few moments after the sun broke the eastern horizon to give you an idea of how deep the arroyos are.
Looking far to the east is the Salton Sea, which today sits 235 feet BELOW sea level. From one to 5 million years ago, the Borrego Badlands were the bottom of an ancient sea..
Sunrise over the Borrego Badlands
Sunrise this morning from Font’s Point overlooking the Borrego Badlands. The location is nicknamed “California’s Grand Canyon” because it is straight down from where I made this photo. Kinda’ scary!
Font’s Point is at the end of a 4 mile long “4-wheel drive only” off-road trail in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park near Borrego Springs.
Pedro E. Guerrero’s baby saguaro all grown-up.
While watching the PBS American Masters episode on the life, work and career of acclaimed photographer Pedro E. Guerrero, a photograph he created caught my eye.
Guerrero’s photograph of Taliesin West, likely taken in the 1930s or 40s from the dirt road leading up to Taliesin West, showed a small saguaro cactus about two feet tall in the foreground along side the road.
My reaction was, “I think I have photos of that same cactus taken on my last visit to Taliesin West.” Sure enough, I did.
What was just a two foot cactus in Guerrero’s photograph had grown to be a towering giant well over 20 feet tall with seven “arms” extending to the skies. Even the three rocks shown in his original photo were still there, albeit the road has since been paved.
Neapolitan Lane
One of my favorite homes set along the canals of Naples Island, Long Beach, California.
Windseeker soars to meet Jet Airplane
I came across this photo taken back in February 2012 when I joined the younger and more adventuresome members of my family for a day at Knott’s Berry Farm to celebrate a birthday. As everyone knows, or should know, I don’t do thrill rides.
While I waited for the family daredevils on the ground, I snapped this picture of them spinning around on the Windseeker ride 300 feet in the air as a jet passed overhead.
The photo was published later that week by the Los Angeles Times as their selection for “photo of the day”, making it my first official (and probably last) published “art photography”…
It was a ton of fun to hang with everyone that day, and still like the photo, and trying to identify which danging feet belongs to which family member…
The Caracal
The Caracal’s ancestral home ranges from central India into Asia, across Jordan, Israel, the Arabian Peninsula, and the African continent.
Jay Leno’s 1966 Olds Toronado
Here’s a couple of photos of Jay Leno’s 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado I took while visiting his studios that some of you might enjoy…
Originally a front-wheel drive powered by a 7-liter generating 385 HP, Jay stepped up the game by transforming his into a 1,070 horsepower real-wheel drive rocket ship, sitting on a modified C5 Corvette chassis.
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