Higgins found inspiration in the dramatic landscape around Taos, New Mexico, where he lived after 1914. In Arroyo Landscape, he emphasized the patterns and textures of the land and abstract versions of the distinctive vegetation of the area. Higgins conveyed the dry stream bed and the arid desert atmosphere by applying the watercolor with a relatively dry brush, allowing the texture and whiteness of the paper to heighten the sense of sun-parched land.
