The trees are made up of strongly contrasting patches of color and form a diagonal movement into depth. While that and the diminished size of the trees sets up a movement in one direction; white waves both parallel and oppose the direction of the palm trees to create some visual energy.

.A soft evening light illuminates the unpaved area behind the buildings on Washington Ave.
Railroad tracks, wooden crossing signs, here appear as fragments of a bygone industrial age. The slender branches of a tree are all that remain of the fertile land on which the warehouses were developed.

A green belt of trees separates the sunny path near the top of the hills from the pond below. Above the trees the landscape fades to lighter shades of pink and violet.

Although I enjoy visiting large California deserts- like Death Valley - painting them is more difficult than making a study of a cactus garden at close range in the Arboretum.
The problem with making a large desert landscape is choosing what to leave in and what to leave out. How to connect the plants to each other, to the land, and how to avoid repetition. Although one could say this kind of problem could occur in any landscape, here it just seemed more obvious.
My solution was to open up the foreground and create a shallow “ stage” on which to show the twisting rivulets where the rain had carved up
the soil. In doing this the cacti were pushed to the sides. The twisting chanels left by the rain would be continued in the movements of the trees and clouds, thus connecting earth and sky in a swirling mass.