Taking You There: ‘The Mountain and the Valley’

Taking You There: ‘The Mountain and the Valley’
A detail from “The Mountain and the Valley,” circa 1970, although signed, by an unknown artist. Oil on Canvas, 48 inches by 36 inches. Courtesy of Wayne Barnes
Wayne A. Barnes
Updated:
On Christmas break during my last year of law school in 1970, I felt pretty good, with one semester to go before I might take on the world and become a practicing attorney.

I borrowed my mother’s old gray Rambler and drove to the nearby Cherry Hill Mall in South Jersey for some last-minute shopping. I chanced to walk into an art gallery, wondering what mall art might look like. High up on a wall was a painting that took my breath away.

Wayne A. Barnes
Wayne A. Barnes
Author
Wayne A. Barnes was an FBI agent for 29 years working counterintelligence. He had many undercover assignments, including as a member of the Black Panthers. His first spy stories were from debriefing Soviet KGB defectors. He now investigates privately in South Florida.
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