Cardónix

The Cardón, Mexican Giant Cardon, Elephant Cactus... you get the idea that it's a really big cactus. Similar to the Saguaro but with branching much like a tree. I spent time camping on the edge of a forest of Cardón spending periods of time hanging out in their shade or wandering among them along the shore of the Sea of Cortez in a place called Punto Cirio in Sonora Mexico

Cardón as big as a house.

Considering it can take 75-100 years for a Saguaro to grow one arm, I marveled at the age and castle-like presence of these giants. When I came across this particular one, I spent a lot of time circling and photographing it. A quarter mile from the shoreline, I imagined what processes shape its' life. Sun, intermittent breezes and stormy gales from the sea, desert/sea birds living among it's branches and every night the Milky Way slowly spinning through the sky. That's what hooked me, this creature's sense of time as it moves through the seasons and it's distant relationship with the ageless cosmos every night. That is why there is a diagram of a section of the Milky Way superimposed on the background in my drawing.

Continuing with this series of cyber-natural-ancient-future landscapes, I may move on to close-up scale of objects. Either way, I love this process of ink and digital colorizations. I also love that I can share these prints at a very inexpensive price.