desert brushstrokes

50 miles northeast of Flagstaff in the Painted Desert is the Roden Crater. It is the site of the ambitious terraform installation by James Turrell.

…located in the region of Northern Arizona, it is an unprecedented artwork created within a volcanic cinder cone by light and space artist James Turrell. Representing the culmination of the artist’s lifelong research in the field of human visual and psychological perception, Roden Crater is a controlled environment for the experiencing and contemplation of light.

The site is closed to the public, but I figured it would be interesting to see how close one could get. The deep blue sky was clear with inconsistent wisps of clouds, projecting martian-like shadows on the rolling hills of Route 40.

Turning left off puts you on Leupp Rd. After an additional 20 minutes of narrower lanes, a left onto an anonymous dirt trail crawls through a pasture into increasingly rough terrain. Nearer to the crater, there is too much volcanic rock for regular-walled tires to maneuver without punctures.

This journey was going to pause here. Navigation marked at 15 minutes from Roden Crater itself. That was ok. The drive there was halfway to Winslow, the final destination for the day. Sometimes the full picture completes in brushstrokes.

When Roden Crater is complete, I plan on coming back.