
Paintings, Drawings & Sculpture
I have always been a son of the West. The quality of light, the wide expanses, the high mountains, animals that inhabit the landscape: these speak to me as no
other landscape on earth can. Every time I look at the land, I see something new.
Exploration of color is my my eternal fascination. In this I feel a kinship with Monet, Matisse, Pollock, Rothko and Louis. The western landscape provides me the perfect opportunity to explore color.
For the past 20 years, most of my paintings' themes have centered on landscapes of the American West and to a much lesser extent, figure drawings created during the live model weekly drawing sessions at Third Street Arts in Albuquerque.
Borders, boundaries, edges, and the places where things meet have been constants in my work since I picked up a pencil. In nature, this is the most obvious place where two disparate elements meet – the crest of the mountains against the sky, a tree interrupting the vastness of the plains, the faintest tracks of wildlife on the edges of an arroyo.
Shear, No. 17 - 101 Views of The Sandias, 2008, oil on linen, 46 x 54 in., $20,000.00
Blessing For A Parched Land, No. 32 - 101 Views of The Sandias, 2014,
oil on linen, 54 x 66 in., $35,000.00
Dry Wash Waits For Rain 2008,
oil on linen, 54 x 66 in., $20,00.00
The Road to Las Comadres 2019,
oil on canvas, 8 x 18 in., $2,450.00
Email dennis@dennisliberty.com
to inquire about purchasing
paintings and prints
30th Annual ArtsThrive! Exhibition & Benefit for the Albuquerque Museum - Timed Auction
Artwork on view to the public through December 6, 2020
Timed Auction begins October 24th. Bidding ends November 8, 2020 at 3:00 pm MST
Each item closes one minute apart till all pieces have closed. The auction features 350 original works of art, jewelry, and textiles.
Learn how to register and bid!
Support me.
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Support the Albuquerque Museum!
A bit about the ethos of the paintings. I've reached an age where I can look back and reflect on all the artwork I have created since I told the world at age 11, “I am an artist.” My isolation during COVID-19 has given me the opportunity to wander through thousands of slides and photos I’ve taken of landscapes and other scenes since the 1970s. In doing this, I noticed that I haven’t used human or animal models in my paintings for a very long time. I'm reexamining images that I painted previously to figure out what worked. I've also discovered images that resonate with me now, that didn't captivate me originally. Additionally, my skills have improved since the 1970s. Even so, I am still learning how to manipulate paint.
As I sat in my backyard reading each morning this past spring and early summer, BunBun arrived to inspect me. For over a month, BunBun wandered around the yard nibbling on the weeds, not afraid of me at all. I eventually decided to bring the camera along with my book and took a variety of photos of BunBun. This rabbit was perfect and I knew how to paint it from start to finish. I couldn’t resist the Albrecht Durer theme. Everything was aimed towards structurally enhancing BunBun and making it entirely the center of interest. The background was challenging, however, as it was imagined from the grasses I’ve painted before like, All Flesh Is Grass - Las Comadres No. 1. I'm especially proud of BunBun’s eye: how I captured the highlights, gentleness and beauty. I feel this is the best eye I've ever painted. In September, BunBun became bored with me and the backyard scenery and now hangs out in the front yard. I am already excited to meet the next generation of BunBuns.
It started out with the first stanza of the poem, Antigonish by Hughes Mearns.
Yesterday, upon the stair,
I met a man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
I wish, I wish he'd go away...
In January 1975, I was looking at photos of a snow scene with fresh animal tracks but I was unable to find the critter in the photo. The Mearns poem suddenly came to me. At first glance I thought it was a rabbit but the footprints were wrong. As I reexamined the photo, I eventually saw a tail in the tracks and realized it was a mouse. I am not a photorealist painter in the same league as Joseph Raffael or Richard Estes, etc. The more I examine the image, the deeper I see the color components, the light and structure that are there. My goal is to change the image into a painting and not just reproduce a photo. With this painting, it was important to capture the pink blush of sunlight on the snow.
I originally painted I Saw A Man… in watercolor. Forty-five years later, I returned to this perfect image and repainted it in oil. I feel that the 2020 version of Winter Visitor is better than the original
but I'm quite happy with both. They were each learning experiences.
As a part of his dress uniform, my Father, Capt. Harold F. Liberty, USN, owned a Boat Cloak that he wore to formal evening functions. I inherited it after he died. It is beautiful, enormous, and well-made. The shape of the cape alone was graceful and the model had so much fun dancing with its swing and flow that the painting was finished in my mind before I put the first brush of paint on the canvas. I painted this in acrylics ca. 1978-79. While going through my old slides, the image spoke to me again. The image is iconic because not only is it an odd structure but it is also composed primarily blues and blacks. The challenge was making the dark blues and blacks of the cape interesting.
Fantasy Art + Fine Art + More My new shop is coming soon!
I have always made art that fell outside of the Fine Art category. The concept pieces I made during The Pewter Years (ca. 1979-1994) have been given new life by adding color and transitioning to new media, but whimsey never grows old. Some of that menagerie have now escaped to entertain a whole new generation. I present them here, some humorous, some silly, and some more of a high fantasy bent - but all here for your enjoyment, TOO.
In the DennisLibertyToo shop you will find affordably priced artworks that fit into multiple categories of themes, styles and mediums. You will be able to buy original artwork like Sculpture Wands (my latest creations), as well a variety of products for home and living, wall art, and other accessories. My team is working on branching out to apparel, and that section will be up and running sometime in 2021.
When trying to pigeonhole the styles of artwork I’ve made over the years, family and friends say I “defy description.” At various times all of these labels have been applied to me and my artwork:
I make art. My tiny team will help you with everything else including answering your questions.
They may not be able to respond to you immediately because they have day jobs. Thanks in advance for your patience.