A History of Art
David Henderson has spent decades translating vibration into form. Whether through the low thrum of an electric bass strung across stages with Peter Noone (Herman’s Hermits), The Pointer Sisters, or countless New Mexico nights alongside vocalist Linda Cotton, or through the patient shaping of adobe walls and hand-milled lumber, Henderson has always worked at the intersection of rhythm, craft, and feeling.
In 2016, a new frequency entered the mix: painting.
Entirely self-taught, Henderson discovered digital painting as a fresh canvas for the same improvisational energy he once channeled into live performance. Seven years later, his studio practice has matured into bold, joyful explorations of color, light, and spontaneous composition.
Art that Speaks to Santa Fe Interior Design
Nowhere is this evolution more radiant than in The Botanical Series (2023), a collection that feels like stepping into a sunlit garden designed by jazz itself.
David Henderson’s own words capture the spirit of the series best:
“Music has been the forefront in my life in performance and writing. Now I have found a new and exciting medium to express myself. Music is a vibration that I feel in my body, while painting and working with color is a vibration that excites my soul; both transform the mind.
In this body of work I wanted to create a positive and uplifting emotion to fill a room with beauty. Digital painting allows the flow and spontaneous energy to create exciting and new concepts of composition, similar to the craft I practiced as a musician. When I start a piece I have no preconceived idea of where the work will take me. I just let the colors lead my emotions.
The frames I create are crafted from rough cut lumber which I mill and finesse to a fine furniture finish. These two extremely different mediums represent a tie with my past to my present. Creativity is what inspires my mind, body, and soul.”
The resulting pieces are exuberant bursts of flora that seem to pulse. Oversized blooms, layered petals, and luminous leaves float against saturated grounds in electric magentas, blazing oranges, and deep indigos. There is motion in the work; you can almost hear the improvisational solo taking shape stroke by stroke.
Adding Art Elevates Interior Design
What takes the series beyond pure visual pleasure is Henderson’s handmade framing. Each piece is bordered by frames he mills himself from rough lumber, sanded and finished to the warm, tactile quality of fine furniture. The wood becomes a quiet echo of his earlier life in woodworking and adobe construction, grounding the electric energy of the digital canvas in something you can touch, something that feels rooted in the high-desert earth outside his studio window.
The Botanical Series is more than decoration. It’s evidence of an artist who has spent a lifetime learning to listen to vibration, whether it arrives as a bass line, a chord change, the ring of a hammer on adobe, or the silent hum of color on a screen, and then give it back to the world as joy.
David Henderson is living proof that creativity isn’t a single note held forever. Sometimes it’s an entire second act played in a brand-new key, and brighter than anyone could have imagined.
To see more of The Botanical Series and current work, contact us for custom art curation and inspiration. Or, if you’re lucky enough to be passing through Albuquerque, make an appointment to visit the studio where the desert light and a lifetime of rhythm keep making something beautiful happen.