The Earth’s Sharp Edge, Part 4 is Francis Di Fronzo’s continuing exploration of the indomitable spirit that sent people to undeveloped western land to make their fortune.
A recurring theme in the artist’s work is the barren landscape of the Mojave Desert, its light, its skies, and the failed or still surviving presence of the fortune seekers. Di Fronzo spent nine weeks in the summer of 1991 living in a tiny house there, spending his days drawing skulls, desert plants, and self portraits. The loneliness and emptiness were too much for him, and he walked out of the little house leaving everything behind, including his trove of drawings.
Returning to the area six years later, the house was gone, but the experience of the landscape came back to him. “I realized that those few weeks had a massive influence on the way I create everything visually,” he says. “I remember peaceful sunsets--a magical time. I’d turn and watch the eastern sky and the purple shadow of the earth slowly creeping up
