Thomas Moran depicts the extraordinary colors of the American West in this watercolor and pastel sketch, In the Narrows, Zion Valley, the Gate Keeper.¹ Dazzling whites, dusky reds, rosy pinks, and even hints of lavender highlight the dove grays, soft tans, and rich chocolate browns of the cliffs. White quartz sand fused with calcium carbonate, silica, and red iron oxide in varying combinations produces the startling array of colors seen in the sandstone bluffs.² A brilliant blue sky provides the backdrop for the cliffs that rise precipitously from the pale grayish blue of the waterway.

Moran was one of the first Anglo-American artists to visit and portray Zion Valley.³ Located on the North Fork of the Virgin River, the Narrows measures only twenty to thirty feet wide in places, yet the cliffs can reach over one thousand feet in height.⁴ The artist visited the region in 1873 when he accompanied Major John Wesley Powell’s expedition to the Grand Canyon. Moran joined the group in Salt Lake City; before heading to Arizona, the expedition traveled on horseback through southwest Utah (15.449) and what would become Zion National Park.⁵

—Sandra Pauly, Henry Luce Foundation Curatorial Scholar for Moran Collection Research, 2021

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¹ Amy McKinney, a ranger at Zion National Park, notes that the historic name for the trail leading into the Narrows was the “Gateway to the Narrows”; thus, “Gate Keeper” could be a reference to the trail name. Amy McKinney, email message to author, January 26, 2021.
² Hafen, “This Immense Prodigality of Color,” 5.
³ Hafen, “This Immense Prodigality of Color,” 1, 6, 9. Artist Frederick S. Dellenbaugh (1853–1935) had accompanied Powell to the Grand Canyon and Zion Valley a year earlier, in 1871–72; he traveled to Zion again in 1903, creating several oil paintings that he exhibited at the St. Louis World’s Fair the following year.
⁴ See the National Park Service’s website for Zion National Park.
⁵ Wilkins, Thomas Moran: Artist of the Mountains, 115–22.