Joan M. LaRue – NWR Artist

Joan M LaRue”A” stands for ART AND ADVENTURE.” They go hand in hand for the outdoor artist.
Allow me to mention a few incidents that would never have happened without art as my companion. We were trekking in Nepalese Himalayan foothills when sleet and fog moved in. Narrow trails became very slick and treacherous and it was a long ways DOWN the slopes. I was arrested in a small Spanish village for not being able to produce my passport which was in the hotel office in Barcelona for safekeeping. I was bathing astride an elephant in the Chitwan Jungle near India when the mahoot gave her a command to submerge. The other guests really enjoyed the show. I was seriously chased by guard dogs in Moscow and Cochabamba when scouting out places to paint. I intruded into a Portuguese gypsy camp uninvited and lived to paint the scene. HOWEVER, TOPPING THE LIST: a gigantic gray whale mama allowed me to pet her baby in one of Baja’s  warm water lagoons that opens out into the ocean; along with the other regular rigorous hazards you have an idea of the life of the plein air artist.