Limantour: A Painting at the Mesa Refuge

A High spot in my life

Many years ago I painted a long horizontal painting over six feet long and five feet high titled “Limantour.” I chose as subject matter a section of the Limantour beach known as the “locals’ beach.” This is a section of the beach that is unmarked and further south of the main parking lot and entrance. Most people choose the main entrance for its easier access, sandy beach, tables, and bathroom access.  

Local folks, however, usually choose an unmarked road to the left that goes to an undeveloped area with a few rutted parking spots. A modest trail leads through the wild lupin and the swampy area of marsh land up the side of an imposing sand dune that has clumps of spiky stiff grass. From that point the path stops, and a wide vista opens into an unobstructed view of the ocean.

Many times, from that vantage point, I could see in the far distance single fishermen far apart along the shore with long poles and lines between high and low tide markers. They were individuals that seemed to staunchly honor their solitude and the promise of catch.

I did several paintings of them in their aloneness as a monument to humanity and the wide open pacific. It was always a memorable poignant scene to me. Metaphorically, I loved the contrast of humans fishing and the ocean.

But I also was enchanted by the open sea, unabashed, without frills or ornaments. Even then I knew that my true calling as an artist was to bear witness to the plain song of the elements with its bare sea and the long sandy plain of beach without elaborating sunsets or wind or even stars. I loved this realism in the plainest sense. This to me was what it meant to be an American Painter. 

So I painted this painting which I titled Limantour. I painted it stretched out in simplicity, confident that in its barest form it would be enough. As humans we would recognize the vastness of its mystery, in its simplicity, strictness, in its “isness”. And by recognizing this “isness" it would also reflect human”ness” in its elementary state that is like this ocean, bare, awful, yet beautiful in its ultimate divinity and “isness” Another word for this experience could be “unknowningness.”

Since I sold the painting long ago I did not see it again for many years. My reacquainting with it happened at the Mesa Refuge in 2025. The painting of Limantour was donated to the Mesa Refuge by the collectors who owned it and now it is currently hanging on the large wall in the newly renovated gathering room. 

It is as if the room was built for it and the painting was painted for the room. Everything fits together harmoniously, the painting, the color of the painted walls, the rugs, the wide windows overlooking the marshy end of Tomales Bay and beyond. The wide pacific is unfettered all the way to Japan, blocked only by the Inverness Ridge. On many days and nights the sounds of the pacific softly beat under all the other sounds that fill the sky. The bird songs, trucks, children, cars, wind of all sorts, and the miscellaneous sounds that humans make while living life have an undertow of sound harmony that accompanies the living ocean.

I hadn’t seen the painting in such a long time I was startled and amazed the first time I saw it installed at the Mesa Refuge. When I had painted it I had no idea what I would think of it if I were to see it in the future. And there I was, looking at it to see how and what this painting had to offer me. It was unknown and yet known to me.

And what I saw was this: That the painting was the best of what I had to offer at that time and it still was my best in this time. It was strong and complex and simple. Just as I am now. And it is beautiful in the way I want it to be beautiful. And that the inner beauty of the viewer completes the inner beauty of the painting. 

In a way, seeing it in this space, I felt complete in a way a retrospective show would complete my integrity as an artist. The values that I have held have increased in depth and meaning and self awareness. And others who shared these values also were experiencing this awareness. I really couldn’t ask for more as an artist. Out of all of the self questioning, ambivalence, struggles, queries and endless endeavors, something of me endured and bonded with like minded individuals. A connection had been made. What I started out in blind faith was indeed going in the right direction. And as I stand on the hilltop of the present I am witnessing the unconscious pulls that I had then were correct and integrated. This I see from where I am now and know that I can continue forward in my life with a sense of wholeness and courage that was totally unexpected but made complete sense. 

Elizabeth Fishel and Susan Tillett led a workshop at the Mesa Refuge, a writer’s retreat, recently in May. “Writing the Language of Color in the Home of Sam Francis.” They asked the writers to observe “Limantour” and write about it. The results were combined into a poem called a “Cento” (meaning “Patchwork,” a collage poem). They also added a line of mine, “It was as if the heart, not the head, had eyes,” as a refrain. 

I was deeply touched by the results which I include here. Not only do I love poetry, but I feel that poetry with metaphors and analogies have a great influence on my work. My paintings are accessible through the contemplative aspects of the imagination and can express great truths that can only be hinted at on the peripheries of the mind and heart. Thus, painting will always be my vehicle because it is can contain such great subtleties. 

This is the poem: “Limantour Cento”

Movement arrested, an attempt to capture what refuses to be still

Two waves break, bringing forth the mysterious rhythm that the ocean holds,

A moment in time, captured for all.

It was as if the heart, not the head, had eyes.

You draw me in, beckoning me to leave the brown shore

The tawny beach lies like a sunning woman

It was as if the heart, not the head had eyes

Streaks of blue, boasting depth and salinity while marinating the landscape,

Watercolors of these, blend into one another

It was as if the heart, not the head, had eyes.

Lost in the cobalt/periwinkle behind the break,

The heartbreaking catch of light at shore’s edge

At the very edge of the horizon, almost unnoticed, is a flick of red-

A sailboat, a tanker drifting beyond our sight and imagination

It was if the heart, not the head, had eyes.

Starkness, coldness, calmness- they all share a place

As you brought me, my living ghost,

As green holds the blue current and the past.

It was if the heart, not the head, had eyes.

The beating heart of the ocean

And finally, a favorite poem of mine by William Stafford. This poem “Any Journey”, by William Stafford, captures for me some of the density of the path of life:

“Any Journey”

When God watches you walk, you are

neither straight nor crooked. The journey 

stretches out, and all of its reasons

beat like a heart, Coming back, no triumph,

no regret, you fold into the curves,

left, right, and arrive. You touch

the door. The road straightens behind you.

It is now. It has all come true.

—William Stafford