Lake above Ophir

Gene Kloss

An ink and sumi drawing by printmaker Gene Kloss. The location is one of the lakes above Ophir in Southwestern Colorado near Lizard's Head Pass in the San Juan Mountains. Kloss used a number of her pleine-aire drawings as references for her etchings and aquatints. This drawing was used as a reference for the etching and drypoint of the same name, done in 1981 in an edition of 49 (Sanchez 608).

The Klosses initially moved to western Colorado, near the Gunnison River in 1965 returning to Taos because of allergies and gnats. Close friend and collector John Armstrong comments on Kloss's late works on page 204 of Gene Kloss: An American Printmaker:

"...an example of how, during her last years of production she used sketches from the past. After their move to southwest Colorado it was decided that to be places to sketch in early morning they needed transportation and a place to stay. So they bought a pickup with a camper on the back…"

Gene Kloss (1903-1996), painter and printmaker, was born Alice Geneva Glasier in Oakland, California. She studied at the University of California at Berkeley, graduating with honors in art in 1924, and the California School of Fine Arts in San Francisco. With the encouragement of her professor, Perham Nahl, she began etching in 1927. In 1925 she married poet/author Phillips Kloss and shortened her name, adopting the masculine form of her middle name so that her work would be viewed with an unprejudiced eye and entry into exhibitions would not be denied her.

She and Phillips divided their time between Berkeley and Taos hauling her Sturges press each way until settling permanently in Taos in 1945.