"A burial party lays a loved one to rest at Loma Sandia, about 2700 years ago. This interpretive painting by TBH artist Frank Weir accurately depicts some of the archeological evidence documented at this ancient cemetery site. Other elements reflect the local landscape and climate. The scene is set on a winter day, just as a "blue norther" arrives, an auspicious moment for a funeral." (Artwork copyright Frank A. Weir, Text copyright Texas Beyond History) Click for full image.
I was at the San Antonio Menger Hotel last night and spent some time looking at all the old pictures on the walls. I started thinking how the rarity of old film based photos compares with the overabundance of digital images today, particularly as the future life of digital images depends on iterative updating of the media upon which they reside. For instance, if you have any images stored on 'floppy' disk or early CDs you might want to see if you can even read them on your current hardware.
This brings me, in a roundabout way, to the University of Texas website Texas Beyond History and the artwork representing the past. It's one thing to take a photo of a current event, but it's something else to dig the artifacts out of the ground and build a visual history from what you find. There are a number of talented artists on this site that do just that, but I want to point to the works of Frank Weir, not only because they are evocative of what life must have been like back then, but also because he's my uncle and it's the least I can do for all the cool art work he's given me over the years.
Please take the time to check out some of these links...
Now if I just had inherited a small percentage of his artistic skill.... ;-)
1 comment:
Frank has been my friend and colleague in archaeology for some 60 years. His art work has help to bring public awareness via visual images based on archaeological data and his experiences as an archeologist. I commissioned him to do three paintings for the Witte Museum for our exhibit Gathering at the Waters, that featured 13,000 years of ancient history around the springs in San Antonio. These paintings are not accessioned in the Witte art collection. Later I had him to two more paintings, one a mortuary scene in the Lower Pecos another mortuary scene in the Mimbres culture of SW New Mexico. I am saddened that this is not home bound and no longer doing art work.
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