For her modern West botanical paintings, artist Dyana Hesson seeks out all the wild plants she can find in Arizona’s backcountry then commits their beauty, strength, and fragility to canvas. The quest takes her far and wide and is as serious as the research that goes into it. “If you really want to understand the wild West, study the wildflowers,” she advises. “Before the cowboys and early settlers, there was land and plants. They offer subsistence and shade, medicine and beauty.”Among Arizona’s hiking set, Hesson is well-known both for her outdoor prowess and the resulting artworks. Her blue Jeep Wrangler with the license plate “TRBLUE” has become famous in its own right. “When I pull up to a trailhead, folks will say, ‘Hey, there’s Blue!’” she says. She searches out plants, the rarer, the better, on mountains and in washes throughout the state for her botanical paintings.