James Ellison
"Pilgrim"
oil
print, edition limited to 395
image size: 28 in x 14 in

This landscape is located in Chino Hills. The view is from a hill north of Grand Avenue looking towards the San Bernardino mountains. It is 7:30 in the morning near the end of March. The original is a 24" x 48" oil painting completed in 1993.

At first, Pilgrim may seem an unusual title for this painting, but look closer at the painting. It appears to be a beautiful meadow, a place where a person would like to escape from the strain of life. Yet, your eyes are drawn from the pasture. They move to the foot of the mountains at the right where you see storm clouds. This focal point is the center of a radial design. You can draw imaginary lines out from this center. There are three lines up the right side of each of the mountains. Another line runs across the top of the two hills on the left. One more line goes along the farthest visible part of the farm road, across the top of the middle hill, to the base of the stony hill at center left. Still another line can be drawn to the left side of the Purple Lupine. This imploding power motif is used to draw the pilgrim on a journey between the hills, to the foot of the mountains and beyond. But who is the pilgrim? Is it one of the cows? No, they are content where they are. Symbolically the right side where the sun is rising stands for the future. The cows have embraced the present and are not interested in a pilgrimage but only in feeding and playing on the new grass. The yellow green of the grass has a double meaning, first new life and secondly a lie, for this grass will not always be green. The summer sun will scorch this area brown and there will be hunger. Though this is a good resting place for now, the pilgrim cannot remain. So who is the pilgrim? Is it the Lady Bug hidden in the Purple Lupine? Though she is a wanderer she is not the pilgrim. Could the pilgrim be the one whom the black cow is staring at? Yes, the pilgrim is you the viewer who has lain down to rest, in front of the Purple Lupine, with the California Poppies to your right. The Poppy is a symbol of death and new life from our wars. It grows out of the corner of death reaching up to the farm road that swings back to the left, through the shadow, then to the right over the hill to somewhere out of sight. There may even be a storm or two up ahead. So it is with our journey. Sometimes we may have to backtrack to get around an obstacle. There may be shadows of sadness cast over our way. We may even lose sight of where we are headed from time to time. There is always the fear of the unknown the storms that may be ahead but we cannot remain. We are being called by the rising of the "Son" to continue on our journey in hopes of greener pastures.

The Bible text that I have selected for this picture is Hebrews 11:1, 810