About The Artwork
Brian Taaffe-Cordova reimagines the desert Southwest with whimsical clarity and bold visual rhythm. Set beneath towering, cloud-like forms and a vast cobalt sky, a lone figure and their horse make their quiet journey across a surreal terrain scattered with geometric stones and flattened planes of color.
The composition draws from the visual language of both Indigenous symbolism and modernist minimalism. Taaffe-Cordova’s stylized palette—purples, rusts, and ochres—evokes the layered landscapes of the high desert, while the graphic outlines and simplified forms create a dreamlike, almost mythic atmosphere.
The painting captures a moment of movement and solitude, honoring the ancestral pathways and everyday rituals that tie people to land. Both playful and contemplative, Headed to the Watering Hole invites viewers to explore a landscape where memory, geometry, and spirit converge.
