The heart and soul of landscape art

The Deseret Morning News and Days of '47 Landscape Art Show, "Color of the Land 2003," has the best mix of style, content technique and medium since the show's revival in 1999.

With 225 entries — 53 of them juried in works — visitors to the exhibition in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building through July 24 will be impressed by the heart, soul and talent of Utah's landscape painters.

This year's jurors — Earl Jones, M'lisa Paulsen and Richard Van Wagoner — selected Rob Colvin's oil "Casson Butte" as the winner of the $5,000 Purchase/First Place award. Richly painted and brooding, this boldly designed Dixon-esque piece recalls art from the Depression era or WPA.

The painting becomes part of the Deseret Morning News' corporate collection.

"Rendezvous Beach" by Lo Andriese received the $1,000 Second Place award. With its curiously involved, vertical composition of clouds, land, birds and water, the painting will have gallerygoers pondering the event and the underlying meaning of the image.

The Third Place award, worth $800, went to Steve Larson for his vividly colored, well-crafted depiction of an old street and its environs.

This year there were also five no-cash Awards of Merit presented: "The Enticer II" by Doug Braithwaite, "Stormy Day on the River" by Robert Van Bullough, "Morgan, UT" by George Handrahan, "Fall in Heber Valley" by Norma Molen and "Olympus Spring From the Parleys" by Erla Young.

The quality level of entries in this year's "Color of the Land" was the highest ever, and those not selected to be part of the exhibition need not feel slighted; the jurors spent four hours considering every piece, emphasizing again and again the selective nature of the jurying process. With another set of jurists, they knew it would have been an entirely different-looking show.

In its new location in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, the 2003 "Color of the Land" carries on the illustrious tradition of landscape painting in Utah, giving every individual who visits the show an appreciation of the land, and the artists who choose to record its beauty.

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If you go . . .

What: Color of the Land 2003

Where: Joseph Smith Memorial Building

When: Through July 24

How much: Free

Phone: 237-2135

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E-mail: gagon@desnews.com