Умер известный художник и фотограф Уолтер Нельсон, прославившийся смелыми приключениями и уникальным взглядом на искусство

It was 1989 and, on the adventure of a lifetime, Walter Nelson was driving his best friend crazy. Nelson, a photographer and artist who died last month in Abiquiú, was along for a 10-week horseback ride with writer Douglas Preston, tracing 1,000 miles of the route conquistador Francisco Vásquez de Coronado took in the 16th century during his famed expedition through today’s American Southwest. “We’d be riding along, it’s 110 degrees in southern Arizona. He’d say, ‘Oh here’s a photograph,’ ” Preston said. “It’d take him an hour to unpack the horse and set up his camera, and then he’s just sitting there.” Preston said he would ask Nelson when he was going to take the photograph, to which Nelson would respond he was “waiting for the light.” “I’m like, ‘Walter, we’ve got 1,000 miles to ride here. What are you doing?’ ” Preston said. “Walter kept saying to me, ‘Doug, why do you need to go fast?... This is the process. You have to appreciate the process.’ ” Preston said the perspective was a “huge lesson” — and typical of Nelson, who throughout his life was “all about the here and now.” Nelson, a celebrated multidisciplinary artist and longtime New Mexico resident whose embrace of adventure could verge on the reckless, died suddenly Aug. 12 while walking his dog on a trail near his Abiquiú home and studio. His family members do not know the cause of death and are awaiting the results of an autopsy from the New Mexico Office of the Medical Examiner, according to son Vince Nelson. Walter Nelson was 84. Survivors include his son Vince Nelson (Bethany), five grandchildren, nine great-grandchildren and two nephews. Spirituality and art Born July 31, 1942, in Wichita Falls, Texas, Walter Nelson started out as a commercial photographer, first in Houston and later in New York City. He suffered tragedy early in life when his wife Jan, who was pregnant, was killed in a car wreck involving a drunken driver. Nelson was about 20 years old, according to his family’s obituary. Vince Nelson said the experience started his father, who had converted to Catholicism for his wife, on a spiritual journey that lasted the rest of his life. “Trying to fit him into a church or anything like that... he would have none of that,” said Nelson, who himself was a pastor for 17 years. “At the same time, he was very spiritual.” After Walter Nelson’s later marriage to Vince Nelson’s mother ended in divorce, Walter Nelson got custody of his son. Art was a constant presence. Vince Nelson said he went along with his father on trips to New Mexico and Colorado, often carrying the tripod for his camera. “When we lived in New York City, he used to drag me to all the museums,” he said. “I hated it at the time. I’m grateful now.” Move to New Mexico, art career Nelson, who was heavily influenced by Georgia O’Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz, among others, moved to Santa Fe in 1982 to pursue art, initially exploring black-and-white landscapes and still life, according to a catalog of his work provided by his son. It was just one of his many eras. “He was like Picasso in the sense that he had periods where his vision, his style would change,” Preston said. A period of traditional painting on paper and canvas later led to “three-dimensional paintings” that Preston described as a painting-sculpture hybrid. Nelson took a trip to Australia at one point and came home with all sorts of items like seed pods and feathers he’d gathered, which he later used in Dreamtime, a series inspired by aboriginal Australians’ beliefs and traditions. He found and became a devotee of O’Keeffe’s “The Black Place” — a then-secret site that inspired many of her paintings. While a number of other O’Keeffe fans have since sought out the location, Preston said he believed Nelson was among the earliest people to do so. During a more abstract phase, Preston said Nelson created a series of works using baling wire found on a road near his home, crushed and flattened by passing cars. He photographed the dark, serpentine shapes of patches in a Walmart parking lot, resulting in T A R, a collection Preston said looked like “alien landscapes that were absolutely gorgeous.” “It’s like, how many thousands of people walked past this without ever seeing anything?” Preston said. “It took a Walter Nelson to look at the patterns in tar in this ordinary, cracked, asphalt parking lot and find something absolutely beautiful and ethereal and strange and mysterious in it.” Nelson’s work was exhibited around the world, according to his family’s obituary, including in New York, Paris and Osaka, Japan, as well as in Santa Fe. His photographs of the Coronado trip were not published in Preston’s book, Cities of Gold. But Preston said plans are in the works to publish the photos in a coffee table-style book in honor of the upcoming 40-year anniversary of the ride. Danger and joy Nelson was “bold and brash” in his love for exploring wild landscapes, often in pursuit of a photograph. “He was not afraid of anything,” Vince Nelson said. “There’s been many times he’s lost trucks in rivers and almost flipped trucks.... I saved his life twice kayaking.” Once, Walter Nelson got his Chevy Blazer stuck in a narrow spot as he and his girlfriend at the time drove through Copper Canyon outside Abiquiú. “He looked northward, and he saw that the sky was black, and he realized, ‘Uh-oh that looks like rain, there might be a flash flood coming,’ ” Preston said. Nelson and his girlfriend unloaded his photography equipment and piled it up on a high knoll, Preston said. “About 15 minutes later, a sound came down the canyon.... I remember Walter describing it as like 10 freight trains, and this enormous flash flood came through, pushing boulders and logs,” he said. “[It] hit the car and took it down the canyon.” During the Coronado trip, Arizona’s rugged Salt River Canyon Wilderness Area presented the most frightening challenges, Preston said. “We had to go over this hogback ridge, and halfway up the ridge... Walter got himself and his pack horse on the ledge,” Preston said. “It ended in a cliff, and it was just, like, sheer on both sides.” Preston said he was sure Nelson would not be able to turn the horses around to retreat, fearing his friend was going to go over the edge. “Walter just took the reins, turned his horses around and the horses bunched up their legs and kind of rotated,” he said. Nelson was socially fearless, too, always eager to meet and talk with people. The Coronado expedition involved a fair amount of trespass on ranches, Preston said — not the safest idea, but Nelson’s charming offensive was tough to resist. “He’d charge the rancher with his hand extended, [and say] ‘My name’s Walter Nelson, and my partner Doug Preston and I are following Coronado’s route on horseback, how are you doing,’ ” Preston said. “[It] totally turned the situation around.” It was vintage Walter Nelson, according to his son. “He’s bold. He’s brash. He’s an adventurer, and he’s a lover of people,” Vince Nelson said.