Valley Tree on the Levee Road by JimRode at Friday Night Art

Valley Tree on the Levee Road - Valley Tree is an ink fusion on aluminum by JimRode

Where

Friday Night Art (fridaynightart) in the Rio Grande Valley

The Art

We explored north from Harlingen Texas until the town died out and the mesquite dominated again.

Turning from the highway we found a newly made utility road. I saw the fog of morning in the distance and stopped for a photograph. There before me, mere feet from the destruction of road clearance was a beautiful tree. Not gorgeous in the sense of a magnificent redwood, but beautiful in a dignified way.

This tree had "been around." Even ugly buildings have a dignified beauty if they can hang around for a hundred years. The tree stands watch over a gravel road masked in a fog near the levee. A few feet right and it would have been cut down and burned like country trash. Surviving is dignity confirmed.

Art Details

Valley Tree is an ink fusion on aluminum, 20x30 inches in size. I've used six colors here and they are archival inks that are fused to metal via a mylar print. This plastic-like image is then burnt into the aluminum at approximately 400º so that the inks become infused to the metal. After creating this piece, a box hanger is attached to the rear with an epoxy so that it arrives to your collection ready for wall display.

Valley Tree is by Jim Rode of Friday Night Art

Who

Jim Rode’s FridayNightArt is a listed member of the Oklahoma Visual Arts Coalition (OVAC)

To see artist Jim Rode’s Artist Statement and Bio at OVAC, go to https://www.ovac-ok.org/art/Jim-Rode