The lush village on the eastern incline of the Sierra Madre Range of Mexican mountains, Tamazunchale is the half-way point on most two day trips from Laredo, Texas to Mexico City. Artist Duncan Gleason traveled by car with his wife Dorothy through Mexico in 1947, from Thanksgiving Day until Christmas Day, and twice stopped and stayed in the village. On the return trip home, it was Christmas Eve, and Dorothy wrote “Duncan made a sketch down by the river and then we attended church.” Two other sketches of the village are illustrated in her book “Sketches and Paintings from Mexico”, from the first stop, when they “paused for a few days, sketching and painting and sharpening pencils(her job)”.

The diversity of the regions and people intrigued the Gleasons. The multitude of fruit groves and fields of sugar cane are still prevalent, and the raw materials those crops supply account for the tropical architecture of this scene on the inclined bluff along the Moctezuma River. The native Indian people speak not Spanish, but the language of Nahuatl, which was spoken by the Aztecs. Two women wash items at the river’s bank, while wearing the traditional shoulder-head scarves of the area’s native people. The village is a primary open-market place for the agricultural region, and from its 400 foot elevation the road rises steadily up the mountains to 8,350 feet above the town on the immediate southern road.

Gleason is known for using a wide and interesting color palette. By doing so, he transformed diverse compositions into stylistic works that carry his visual identification, and often as well his original artist labels verso. Where marine works were dominant in his output and expertise, this month-plus journey into Mexico produced a wealth of fine sketch images, oil paintings and lasting memories for the artist and his wife to share with us.

An interesting view of dockside activity, where a man riding a scaffold is painting the metal hull of the German Barque CARIOLANUS with the red oxide primer to retard the attack of the harsh elements and keep the ship sailing on. The plated sections are visible, with the edges lapped over in a roofing style of construction. Another worker stands in the ready on the pier, amongst the barrels awaiting stowage, to assist the workman in moving the plank and keeping him supplied.

German shipping interest built a steel-hulled CARIOLANUS in 1902, and she sailed wide around the world in the last emigrant and nitrate trades, as well as carrying individual cargo runs when they would be found. The ship has arrived in New Bedford, where she is captured by Gleason undergoing some needed upkeep to the ship. The name itself comes down through history, first as a Roman Aristocrat, immortalized by the English master William Shakespear, as well as at least two other 19th Century sailing ships, one of which sank off Rincon Point, near Santa Barbara, California in 1889.

The diversity of Gleason’s output is to celebrated. This subject is a nice complement to an artist who hung with Hollywood’s elite, was an Olympic champion and a devoted family man, in so much that he could accurately and artistically depict the menial nature of the hard-working sailors. There is no phony glamour here, yet it is a beautiful painting with an interesting composition and a color flair which succeeds in drawing eyes to the painting. The soft swirls in the pier’s wood grain planks alone draw a viewer along the boards, to wonder what lay at stern and across New Bedford Harbor.

Provenance: Private California Collection. Original Artist Label with Title Verso