SantaFeToday.com Santa Fe’s Hometown News
The Historic Santa Fe Foundation is pleased to announce Desert Drift, an exhibition of acrylic and watercolor skyscapes by Santa Fe-based painter, educator, and writer Elaine Ritchel. The exhibition will be on view at the gallery at El Zaguán, 545 Canyon Road.
Desert Drift explores ephemerality, the subtle thresholds between states of being, and the experience of being held in liminality. The work centers on three elemental subjects—clouds, the moon, and the horizon—that embody both continuity and flux.
“In New Mexico, the horizon is a constant presence,” says Ritchel. “I find it fascinating that although we can always see it, we can never reach it. But in that endless quest, that perpetual drift, we are always accompanied by the sky above and the ground below.”
This body of work emerged from a deeply personal period of transition for the artist. Through soft layering and loose rendering, Ritchel captures a sense of “shimmering ether” and shifting light, allowing her painted clouds to undulate, breathe, and dissipate. The result is a series of images that feel soft, ethereal, and alive, inviting viewers to feel immersed and held by the desert sky’s presence.
