Bob Boze Bell's Blog – July 2011 Archive (31)

July 30, 2011

   Saturday night, just got back from the Beast. Sprinkling out. Big monsoon rolling over the Valley. Hit big puddles at about Desert Ridge, lots of thunder. Very humid out now at 7:56 p.m. Wrote up the following email to Ms. Radina in Germany:



   T. and P. and I saw "A Better Life" downtown at AMC in Arizona Center and we all teared up. I clapped at the end (trained by my wife to be assertive when it comes to appreciation). Afterwards we met…

July 29, 2011

   After all the hoopla and buzz, Cowboys & Aliens opens today. Some have already seen it and our cover story is at the printer in Kansas City even as you read this. Here is a sneak peek at the cover:

"There is no terror in a…

July 29, 2011

   Well, tonight Cowboys & Aliens opens. Given my hatred for mash-ups (Frankenstein's Daughter Meets Jesse James) I am rooting for the dang thing to work (see my review two days ago). Meanwhile, Arizona Republic movie reviewer Bill Goodykoontz tackes Cowboys & Aliens this morning and gets off some good points:



• The real star here is the idea.



• It's more fun than good.



• The cowboy…

July 29, 2011

   Yesterday was our anniversary. Ms. Radina and I have been married 32 years. The secret? She's in Germany and I'm in Arizona.

   Just kidding. She's in Prague at the moment.

   A couple sprinkles this morning, but no rain. Muggy out. Chickens being goofy, but what else is new?

   Played with more dust effects. Noodled the dust until it turned into a cloud. Went over and had breakfast, came back and added…

July 28, 2011

Sometimes I paint myself into a corner and attempt to get out. Learned this trick from Linda Ronstadt's lead guitar player (1974, Red Rooster Bar, Tucson). This morning I whipped this study out before I came into work:

I was intending to put in…

July 27, 2011

   Thanks to our Westerns Editor Henry Beck—Carole Glenn, Ken Amorosano and I got to see a sneak of Cowboys & Aliens last night at one of the Tempe Marketplace Harkins' Theatres. Place was packed. It was supposed to be a media sneak peek, but the place seemed to be salted with quite a few civilians (possibly radio show winners, etc).

   The good news: it's good. In hindsight, I think it's safe to say you really couldn't have…

July 26, 2011

   Sometimes I wonder if I know how to paint jack. This morning I got inspired to do another dust storm image and had a very sweet background (done at the same time I did yesterday's posting of the Sentry Rider). I remembered I had a cool image somewhere of a Mexican cutie sashaying down the blvd. and I actually found it and then wondered if I married her to this wind scene, if that might be mucho groovy.

 …

July 25, 2011

   Here's a fun thing to do if you like good food and tall tales:

 …

July 25, 2011

   Big storm blew in last night at about nine. I was watching  Pinocchio, the 1940 Disney classic animation marvel. Been meaning to watch it for years and hadn't seen it since I saw it at the State Theatre in downtown Kingman. I have a cartoonist friend, Bob Steinhilber, who told me he has a friend who believes Western civilization peaked with the animation in Pinocchio and it's been downhill ever since. I think someone told me there is some…

July 22, 2011

   Finishing up loose ends on September issue. Did ten different studies for the cover image of the Duke standing over Cowboys & Aliens spacecraft wreckage. Here's a sneak peek at the final:

Going up the hill today to…

July 21, 2011

   Went home for lunch and whipped out a little illio on arrastras. This is for a Cave Creek documentary coming out this fall.

Arrastras were used in mining, utilizing a pit with ore placed inside and boulders on top that would be drug around in a…

July 21, 2011

   Finishing up our September issue of True West today. Big weekend in Prescott coming up. Speaking at the reopening of the Phippen Museum on Friday night, and then I'll be in downtown Prescott all day Saturday for the Shady Ladies festival and shootout. Will be nice to get out of the heat (from 110 down to a chilly 101, ha).

   Yesterday I whipped out a couple illustrations for a feature we are doing on "Size Matters". Fred Nolan gave me…

July 20, 2011

   It was a week ago tonight that myself, Ken Amorosano, fellow artists Thom Ross, Buckeye Blake and Annie H. headed into Santa Fe for a reception to coincide with our Billy the Kid Requiem on Thursday night at the Due West Gallery.

   The genesis of the party came from this blog. A lawyer and self-proclaimed Billy afficionado, John "Rocky" Aragon emailed me over the past several years about a manuscript he was working on about the Kid…

July 19, 2011

Would The Duke Approve? Part II: Lots of feisty comments on this cover question for the next issue of True West. One friend here suggested he would have starred in Cowboys & Aliens if it was called Cowboys & Commies. Another added a caption to this image: "What part of illegal don't you understand?"

 …

July 18, 2011

   Spent most of the weekend working on our next cover: Cowboys & Aliens: Would The Duke Approve?

Played with a couple of different ideas, like this one of the Duke lumbering across a desert landscape with a squadron of fifties style flying saucers firing at him:

 …

July 17, 2011

   Last Wednesday I spoke to Paul Hutton's American History class at the University of New Mexico campus in Albuquerque. Big auditorium with stadium seating. Great crowd, lots of laughs and I had fun talking about the Western heroes I love. As a gift, Paul gave me a paperback novelization of William Goldman's 1978 screenplay, "Tom Horn." Of course, William Goldman wrote the screenplay for "Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid," giving us all those…

July 16, 2011

   I saw a wide swath of the Southwest in the last six days, from Texas to New Mexico and back to Arizona. Road trips always give me a fresh perspective on the world. For me, seeing other towns, other people's homes, different communities of artists, cowboys and even renegade lawyers, helps me understand what others are doing to cope and survive and what some are doing to fly high. In some cases, very, very high.

   Random notes…

July 15, 2011

 Landed back at the Triple B Ranch at two this afternoon. Long road trip to three states: highlights included, Saint Jo, Electra, Vernon, Goodnight, Quanah and Amarillo, Texas. The Longhorn Museum (long gone but the sign remains), Tijeras, Lamy, Santa Fe (Rocky Aragon's mural), Albuquerque, Cubero, Grants, Gallup and Stateline, New Mexico. Winslow, Two Guns, Flagstaff (don't forget Winona), Munds Park, Tip Top, New River and Cave…

July 14, 2011

   Just landed at Due West Gallery in Santa Fe. Big "Requiem for Billy" tonight at 5:30. Paul Hutton is coming up to moderate. Already sold a Billy painting. Lots of interest and fun times for me.

Staying at Thom Ross's Alamo house in Lamy, New Mexico. Last night, Thom, Buckeye Blake, Ken Amorosano, Annie Horkan and I went to wild and wooly Billy the Kid wall mural party on the west side of Santa Fe. Rocky Aragon was the artist of the…

July 12, 2011

   Finished up our cover photo shoot of Donna Howell-Sickles at five last night. Had a great celebration dinner in her loft in downtown Saint Jo. Solved life and made many toasts to our success.

   Ken A. and I took off this morning at seven for New Mexico. Drove for a couple hours up through Wichita Falls and Quanah. Town after town, with the same dynamic: pretty houses and failed businesses. We both got hungry and started looking for a…