J.R. has been an artist for forty years. He began as a photographer in the mid ‘70s and a decade later added painting and sculpture to his repertoire. Originally from south Louisiana, he moved onto the Navajo Reservation in 1986. The Cajun expat was employed by the Navajo school system to provide photographs of sacred sites, medicinal plants and record locations on the Navajo timeline for Curriculum Center projects. He logged over a quarter million miles exploring the backcountry of the reservation making many images & friends in the process. In 1992 he moved to the small hamlet of Bluff, Utah and opened Cloud Watcher Gallery where he began a serious study of prehistoric sites pervasive in the Bears Ears region.
J.R. has work on collections with the MOMA/NYC Photography Collection, Carnegie Institute, the National Park Service, the Navajo Nation Museum, Tulane University, American Bank in Phoenix and several museums in Central America. His photographs and paintings have been featured in over seventy exhibitions including Victoria Price Gallery in Santa Fe, Finch Gallery in Phoenix, The Louisiana Arts and Science Center in Baton Rouge, the Edge of the Cedars Museum in Blanding and the Meso-American Research Institute at Tulane University in New Orleans.
In December 2016 President Obama declared an expansive area of San Juan County, Utah as Bears Ears National Monument. It is one of the most diverse geological regions on the planet, rich in prehistoric sites and linked to many present-day native cultures. J.R. has explored Bears Ears territory for three decades. The landscape and rich prehistory coupled with the ever-changing skies are a part of his being. With the designation of the monument J.R. began a series of paintings concerned with various aspects of Bears Ears including abstract interpretations of spiritual connections to the land and those who came before. This monumental undertaking (currently at ninety paintings and counting) reveals his connection to this rugged landscape and it’s bountiful human history.
After years of experimentation, he developed a technique to stabilize 200 million year old natural clay collected in the desert. The ancient material is applied to canvas or wood and goes through a curing/stabilizing process that yields a fired ceramic quality. After the clay dries, he applies various types of paint. Some pieces take over a month to complete.
In addition to his work on canvas and behind the camera, several multi-media sculpture installations completed by JR reside in Bluff and other locations throughout the Southwest. Kos Hai Si Di (Navajo for Cloud Watcher) prefers working with driftwood and found objects to create mythological beings with a contemporary flair.
J.R. believes art should come full circle; from inspiration, contemplation, execution and allowing the finished work to move into different realms by donating select paintings and photographs to over a dozen organizations a year. These include community projects, humanitarian causes, wildlife rehabilitation centers, domestic animal shelters and environmental organizations. In this manner the art becomes a viable means of support to issues that he is concerned with.
In 2018, J.R. completed a decade-long project in the form of a novel, The Yellow Chair. The story is about three artists from different time periods who unite on a mystical four-day mission in canyon country. The current phase of the project is securing a literary agent to present the story to the publishing world.
J.R. is currently building a high country studio in a remote area of southern Utah approximately eighty miles from his Bluff studio. He will divide his time between the lower canyons and the pristine high country. The new studio space will allow him to engage in larger paintings in his Bears Ears series.