CALIFORNIA GOLD
Mentor Huebner (c) 1959
Oil on Masonite 30" X 24"
CALIFORNIA
GOLD
BY
There is
a six year span between Mentor’s paintings, “Mojave
Gold” and “California Gold”. He created a
lot of paintings in the interim so I wont excuse his titles
as they are not redundant even though he used “Gold”
twice.
In "Mojave Gold", he was referring to the golden hues
of the mountains and the gold buried beneath them. In "California
Gold", he addressed the Sunflowers that are wildly scattered
throughout the California hillsides.
Vincent Van Gogh was Mentor’s favorite artist. But that
isn't why Mentor painted “California Gold". Mentor
loved Sunflowers. And even though our home is located in an
area where Sunflowers exist in profuse abundance, sadly, we
could never grow one.
Sunflowers even grow out of cracks in dried up abandoned parking
lots. We'd see them
everywhere; along the highways, the side streets, peeking through
fences in the barrios ~ but never ever in our own garden.
Mentor would return from painting, carrying handfuls of flowers.
He particularly made an effort to bring home Sunflowers. “Honey,
try these. Maybe they’ll work”. But they didn't!
“Maybe there’s arsenic in the soil”. But there
wasn't.
Since everything else was blooming, invited or not, we never
stopped trying.
Then on Christmas Day, nine months after Mentor had died, way
out back, almost to the edge of the property line, I spotted
two very tall, very graceful Sunflowers, swaying in the breeze.
They seemed to have sprung up over night. I gaze out over the
terrain from my writing room window, daily. They weren't there
before.
Of course I take it as a sign. It makes me wonder.
I wonder if it means that Sunflower seeds can lie dormant for
decades, or that Mentor and Vincent have met.
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