by Lana Cunningham
“Millions of men have lived to fight, build palaces and boundaries, shape destinies and societies; but the compelling force of all times has been the force of originality and creation profoundly affecting the roots of human spirit.”—Ansel Adams, prominent photographer of the American West
Thousands of people have landed in the Permian Basin, first to tame the land with sheep and cattle, then by raising cotton and other crops, and, finally, by drilling deep to find the nation’s largest source of petroleum. Driving each person was not just the desire for success but creative forces that helped them solve problems and envision the next step.
The latest expression of creativity appears to be… artwork. As office buildings were constructed or old ones remodeled in recent years in Midland, artwork played a prominent role in the overall designs. For a major, like Chevron, and an independent, like Crownquest, the inclusion of art specific to their firm was never a question. When independent David Arrington remodeled an older office building, he designed the top two floors to house his world-famous Ansel Adams photography collection.
A tour of these three buildings offers an art lover a look at each company’s history in three-dimensional forms. And the brilliant creative mind of the photographer Adams brings everyday scenes into such extreme focus that a viewer realizes how much he misses in the world around him daily.
For many companies, there is an underlying goal to displaying art. Recent studies reported in the May 1, 2016, edition of Forbes magazine confirm that art in the workplace reduces stress, increases creativity, and encourages expression of opinions.
CHEVRON
When Chevron officials began looking at designs for its new $100 million, 330,000-square-foot campus in west Midland, their art consultant was pulled into the conversations. Sandy Delacroix has worked with Chevron since 2005. “I was supposed to have a six-week contract, but it never ended,” she said with a laugh.
The Houston native travels the world seeking the right pieces for each Chevron office location. The guiding rule, she said, is following the mission statement of the Chevron Way that focuses on “people, partnership, and performance.”
In 2013, Ms. Delacroix attended a meeting with HOK Architects, Chevron officials, and employees. “Architects are listening more to the people,” she said of the trend in workspace design, a trend that explains why new properties include workout rooms, golf putting greens, rest areas, and other amenities.
Ms. Delacroix saw the drawings for a large lobby on the first floor and knew that that space cried out for a mural that would tell Chevron’s story in the Permian Basin.
The first chapter of that story began with the company that was the precursor of Chevron… Standard Oil. A company poster starts with 1881, when Midway Station was created by the Texas and Pacific (T&P) Railway. The station was later renamed Midland. The State gave T&P Railway several square miles of surface and mineral rights for each mile of track laid. This became the basis for Chevron’s checkerboard mineral fee across West Texas. In 1922, leases were acquired in Mitchell and adjoining counties in the west-central portion of the state. By the end of that year, the company had begun drilling in Colorado and Mitchell counties. In 1926, a Gulf discovery well on the McElroy Ranch became the fifth successful wildcat in the Permian Basin and flowed at 195 barrels of oil per day. Gulf then constructed a large tank farm beside the railroad to the east of Midland. Other major fields were discovered in the following years. In 1984, Gulf merged with Chevron, and Getty merged with Texaco. In 2001, Chevron and Texaco merged. Then, in 2005, Chevron acquired Unocal. In 2011, Chevron celebrated 5 billion barrels of production in the Permian Basin, according to a timeline prepared by the corporation.
The question was how to incorporate all that history into a piece of art.
She envisioned the design to be similar to the Texas Post Office murals painted during the late 1930s. The resulting mural, painted by Laura Lewis of Mason County, provides the focal point for the lobby. (Please see sidebar on the mural.)
But that’s not where Ms. Delacroix’s job ended. She selected artwork for each floor and themed the spaces. The first floor features a western theme with cowboys and barbed wire. The second floor is devoted to Native Americans and tribes that lived in the Permian Basin. The third floor features pioneer women in the region, while the top floor points to the Hispanic influence.
“I choose only regional artists,” she said. “The artists had to be from the region or their subject had to be Texas. For example, all photography is Texas-based.” Midland-area photographers contributed many of the photographs adorning the campus. The downtown night scene of Midland, depicted in a mural in the workout room, was taken by photographer Steven Tippett in late 2015. A wood artist in the Permian Basin region created the bookends for each floor.
The art offers employees a mental break. Ms. Vick noted, “It’s like a treasure hunt. You go by it all the time and finally take the time to read the information about it and discover something.”
Chevron security officer Allen Hancock added, “When I stop and look at it, I find different things in it.”
“It took me three years to collect it all,” Ms. Delacroix said. “It’s not just artwork put in there for no reason. This was a work of love.”
CROWNQUEST
Before walking through the doors of CrownQuest Operating LLC at 18 Desta Drive, the influence of art surrounds a visitor. Curving over the front doors is a frieze that depicts the area economic base: cattle and petroleum. The CrownQuest logo can be seen in even the drilling rig design on the frieze and in light fixtures outside and throughout the building.
From light fixtures and stairwells to art on the walls, every piece speaks of West Texas, the petroleum industry, and CrownQuest’s history with Tim Dunn as chief executive officer.
The $14.9 million, 60,000-square-foot building opened in late 2015. Bobby Floyd, president of CrownQuest and the force behind much of the art collection in the new building, explained that the firm owned a building off Airport Road and then sold it to Apache Corporation.
“Apache needed the building right away and we didn’t have anywhere to go,” he said. For almost two years, employees battled their way through heavy traffic to leased space downtown while the new building was under construction. Architect Rod Roberts was instructed to design the new office to look similar to Rough Creek Lodge, a hunting and fishing retreat near Walnut Springs.
Tools of the petroleum industry were used in the building’s design, including sucker rods for rails, casing that juts out of the top of the lobby fireplace and industrial bolts in the walls. Renowned Southwest artist George Kovach was commissioned for five paintings, which tell stories about CrownQuest’s history and partnering companies.
One scene on a 4-by-7-foot painting, depicts a pickup stuck in water on a small town main street and drilling rigs dotting the landscape. “We’re in the mud, basically. This is a satire,” Floyd explained. “In this piece we have the Permian bailing the Paradox out. The Paradox is a basin in southeast Utah. We exited there and we got into the Permian in a big way. The Permian bailed the whole company out of the mud.”
Floyd pointed to other important names on the painting. “These are leases we have: Wilkinson lease is a huge lease in Howard County. Buzzard Roost was a lease we had. Remember the Floyd’s Barber Shop in the old Andy Griffith show? That’s me. Veritas was a big lease play we had. Nail Ranch was another huge lease in Martin County. Free [Bank & Trust] was another good lease for us.”
“These all have symbolic meanings to us. Kovach personalized everything,” Floyd said.
Another painting depicts a dirt-covered Main Street. One building sign says “Enerquest Gas and Oil,” which was the precursor to CrownQuest, according to Floyd. A street sign is painted with the name “E. Hobbs,” which was the “lease that got us started,” he said. “Mary Foster, the name on the oil tanks, was the biggest lease that Pioneer Natural Resources purchased from CrownQuest.”
Another painting depicts the old Midland Train Station with a train that has just pulled in and stopped. Lime Rock, Linn Energy, Patriot Supply, and CrownRock are painted in various spots. A fourth piece includes Pro-Petro, Frac Tech, Robinson Drilling, J.B. Hunt, Cressman Tubulars, and Yellow Dog. Signal Peak in Howard County towers in the background of another painting showing a landman in a Whiting Petroleum truck talking to a couple of ranchers.
“This old landman, he’s got his maps out there. He’s talking to these ranchers who probably own the land about leasing from them. This landman was probably told the ranchers were out herding cattle, so he hops in his car and drives out there to talk to old Billy Bob. It’s just a little story. This painting is very detailed. We have some bluebonnets, cactus, other flowers, a yellow dust devil. The cable tool rig is very detailed. The time frame on all these is the 1920s, 1930s, 1940s,” Floyd said.
All the paintings are brushed with details about CrownQuest and the companies and/or people who have been involved over the years since it was started in 1996.
Floyd said the progression of paintings and history starts with Roddy Petroleum, Enerquest Oil and Gas, then a joint venture between CrownQuest and Lime Rock, which created Crown Rock. And there is Mallard Royalty Partners. “A lot of our sub-companies are named after ducks, like Teal, Mallard, and Canvasback,” Floyd said. Other companies include Texas Land and Royalty, and Abajo Gas Transmission in Utah.
Rather than have Kovach try to incorporate all the aspects into one painting, Floyd had him separate the ideas into five pieces.
Kovach was given a list of the areas where CrownQuest has had leases or now operates. He drove around and looked at the sites to portray them correctly in the paintings.
Old West collections fill spaces throughout the building. In the lobby is an old saddle horn turned into a book holder. Other areas feature antique instruments used by landmen and surveyors.
Stairwells at each end of the building are designed like mineshafts and the interiors are decorated with more antiques, including kerosene lights.
Other artwork includes G. Harvey prints, early Texas memorabilia, and framed artistic photos shot by Dunn’s daughter, Mary Kathryn Wimberley.
DAVID H. ARRINGTON OIL & GAS, INC.
The tiny star-shaped flowers leap out of the photograph, their brilliance sparkling even on a black-and-white background.
It is just one of the thousands of details for which famed photographer Ansel Adams is known. David H. Arrington fell in love with Adams’ work after picking up a camera while in junior high. Twenty years ago, he began acquiring Adams’ work and today the oilman is known for having the largest private collection in the world.
After Arrington purchased the building at 500 W. Wall St. in Midland in 2004, he remodeled the third and fourth floors with a focus on displaying the 600-plus pieces in his collection, which ranges from small Polaroid-sized prints to murals. With still not enough space to display everything, he rotates the pieces and allows employees to choose what they want in their offices. Ansel Adams is everywhere, from the break rooms to the copy rooms to the lobby and to the offices. Meanwhile, other pieces are on loan to museums throughout the world.
“Ansel Adams was the one of the 20th century’s greatest photographers,” said Arrington, who collects details on every aspect of Adams’ life. He has studied the photographs and talked with Adams’ son Michael and others. Among his collection are many prints that hung in the photographer’s home.
“He was talented in so many areas,” Arrington said. “Ansel was an accomplished pianist and he could do any type of photography. He was a master technician in the darkroom as well as with the camera and with his eye. He championed previsualization. He would see in his mind’s eye, standing before his subject, how he wanted the final product to look. Most of the time it was nothing like what the naked eye saw as he stood before his camera.”
The process of previsualization became the photographer’s trademark.
“Monolith, the Face of Half Dome” marks the first time Adams successfully shot and printed a picture using his concept of previsualization. Arrington explained that what Adams saw in his head was not what was seen through the lens.
“You see that the sky is black [in the print], and the sky obviously was not black when he took the picture. With a Red 26 filter, he took the image and then was able to print what he saw in his mind’s eye. That happens to be my favorite picture because I like the way he said it was his first successful attempt. What that means to me is he had many unsuccessful attempts, and don’t we all in life’s journey?
“As a photographer and an oilman, we’ve all had plenty of unsuccessful attempts,” said Arrington, who jokingly called himself Dry-Hole Dave.
Since that first success in 1927, Adams continued to perfect previsualization. He also created the Zone System with 11 grades of black and white with pure black and pure white and all the ranges between, Arrington said.
“Through his own system of manipulating time and light and his method of processing, Ansel then could control the negative that he took in the camera and he could manipulate the print in the darkroom. Thus, he could control the result. His genius was in his simplicity. Today, you can get on the computer with Adobe Photoshop and do in seconds what it took him hours or days to accomplish. The darkroom requires so much skill and he was a master at it.”
“Moonrise over Hernandez, N.M.” is one of the most popular prints and Adams possibly printed 1,100 copies. Arrington purchased the copy that hung in Adams’ house and is among the seven copies he owns. “I can see how he printed it a little differently over the years.”
But Adams wasn’t that prolific in his printing on all the photos. Arrington pointed out that “The Golden Gate Before the Bridge” was printed only once and therefore has a larger value than other pieces.
The piece, “Aspens, Northern New Mexico, 1958” ranks as one of the larger pieces that Arrington owns. The photographer captured the trees as the sun struck a few with the forest remaining in the dark background. Through manipulating his camera and his strategic darkroom work, the trees seem to come out of the wall.
Among Arrington’s favorites are “A Clearing Winter Storm” and “Half Face Dome.”
Adams is known as a nature photographer, but the oilman’s collection refutes that description. In the breakroom hangs a photo of a still life that features an egg, a bottle of liqueur, and an empty milk bottle. The wall over a copying machine displays a photo of painter Georgia O’Keefe smiling at a shy Orville Cox in 1937. According to Arrington, Adams was trying out a 35mm camera and asked the two people to pose. Orville was the manager of Ghost Ranch, N.M., and Georgia lived in a house on the property. Adams’ life work includes photos of people and architecture.
Admirers of Ansel Adams’ work live all over the world. Arrington sends pieces of his collection to various museums, including Texas Tech, the Kimball in Fort Worth, and a small town in Italy.
Meanwhile, employees work and relax among the prints every day. Photos of all sizes cover the walls and add a touch of history to everyone’s office. “We just enjoy it every day,” Arrington said.
Employee Brian Ball said prints are placed on a conference room table and people pick out what they want in their office. “I never realized how beautiful they are until we got them out,” he said.
Tanya Alafa selected a print that shows a shadow of the photographer. “I like that he’s in it,”said Ashley Grimes, while enjoying a print with a young couple walking down a tree-lined path. “The couple reminds me of my grandparents,” she said.
Arrington hasn’t stopped collecting what he calls “perfects.” All photos he owns were hand-printed by the artist and signed.
“This has been a lifelong passion,” Arrington said.
With the companies’ addition of art to the workplace, hundreds of employees are now enjoying the “force of originality and creation” that affects their human spirit.
Lana Cunningham is a freelance writer who has lived in Midland since it was a pleasant city of 60,000 people.