Pure Joy is a fluorescent acrylic painting inspired by the awe of Sedona’s Cathedral Rock. A lone hiker reveals the immense scale of the red-rock spires, while glowing color, hidden hearts, and shifting light transform wonder into gratitude—an experience that deepens from day into night.

Here’s a song that pairs beautifully with this piece—enjoy.

The Story Behind the Painting

Pure Joy was created to celebrate the moment when scale becomes undeniable. Cathedral Rock is one of Sedona’s most impressive formations, but its true size is hard to express without context. In this painting, I added a lone human figure at the saddle—an intentional and rare choice in my work—to give viewers an immediate sense of proportion. That single figure transforms the landscape from beautiful to humbling.

As the spires rise, awe naturally follows, and from awe comes gratitude. That emotional shift is where the title ‘Pure Joy’ was born.

Painted with fluorescent acrylics, the colors behave differently than traditional pigments. In daylight, the sienna cliffs, deep greens, and cobalt sky appear luminous and expansive. Under black light, the painting changes—edges become sharper, the sky darkens, and the rock faces subtly advance, creating a quiet three-dimensional effect unique to the original.

Hidden hearts are woven throughout the desert shapes, inviting slow discovery and reflection. These symbols echo Sedona’s storytelling traditions and connect Pure Joy to its sister painting, Lover’s View, inspired by a local legend of two lovers turned to stone—forever together, yet facing away, reminding us that love and humility must stay in balance.

Within my broader body of work, Pure Joy naturally connects to my Cathedral Rock series such as Cathedral Moon and Creekside Cathedral—my first oil painting, later licensed by Warner Bros.—as well as to later fluorescent acrylic works like Devil’s Bridge and Coyote’s Lunar Serenade. Together, they explore presence, scale, and light as emotional experiences rather than just simple landscapes.

To me, Pure Joy isn’t only about what you see. It’s about what occurs inside when the land asks you to pause, take a deeper breath, and feel thankful just to be there.

The Heart of It All

Art lights up the same part of your brain as

falling in love—it’s an unforgettable feeling.

Available Formats & Editions

Pure Joy is available in the following formats:

• Original fluorescent acrylic painting (when available)
  • Limited Edition Hand-Embellished Giclées (edition of 25)
  • Canvas gallery wrap giclées
  • Luminous Metal prints
  • Gift art photo plaques
  • Giclée art prints

Each Limited Edition Hand-Embellished Giclée begins as a museum-quality giclée produced at the same size as the original. It is then returned to my studio, where I hand-embellish the surface using fluorescent acrylics—adding texture, subtle color shifts, and glowing highlights. No two are ever alike.

Collector’s Note

Pure Joy is part of my Top Nine collection—a group of works most often selected by collectors for their emotional impact and ability to define a space.

My work is also featured at the Village Gallery in Sedona—a Sedona art gallery known for representing only hand-made artwork by local artists, widely regarded as the true heart of Sedona’s art community.