Rubber meets gravel as our four-wheel-drive vehicles rumble up a dusty road. We pull over at a wide bend near a hairpin turn. After gathering supplies, avian researcher Mary Scofield and volunteer Lesley Rolls head downslope through sagebrush, while I accompany avian biologist William Blake...
It’s August and somewhere out beyond Big Sandy, behemoth machines crawl across the landscape. It’s harvest time in Montana. In late summer, the “Golden Triangle” of central Montana is alive with men, women, and machines bringing in the summer’s crop of wheat — the iconic product...
The Seeley-Swan Valley, located in northwest Montana, is nestled between — and populated by — giants, both topographically and botanically. No peak in the region eclipses 10,000 feet in elevation, but the Seeley-Swan is bordered by the Mission Mountains and Swan Range, which collectively encompass...
“The buffalo furnished them meat, robes for bedding, skins for teepee coverings, clothing, foot gear, sinew for sewing, bone splinters for sewing awls, and many other items they required.” — Dominic Michell, Salish Tribal Elder, Circa 1942 While precise numbers are impossible to determine, most authorities estimate...
Residing in the mountains of northwest Montana with her husband and two daughters, Sally Vannoy is living — and painting — her best life. “I live in a place I love, with people I love, doing what I love. What could be better than that?”...
Refining the art of being present, artist Dale Livezey’s palette speaks of Montana through gradient skies and the sentinels of landscape. His paintings offer a mediation on the intangible values of place, a breath of sanctuary, and that transient balance when the world teeters between...
Artist Joe Kronenberg doesn’t spend a lot of time reflecting on his past, but his studio is a repository for its hallmarks. There’s the Ralph “Tuffy” Berg Award for outstanding emerging artist that he received during the 2009 C.M. Russell Museum Auction; a framed reproduction...
Patricia Griffin starts by telling me about the wolves. “There was a pack of them on my back hill this past winter,” the esteemed painter, photographer, and conservationist relays over the phone. She’s taking my call from her studio in Jackson, Wyoming — the reception...
It all started with toads. “I grew up in Texas, and actually, the best thing about Houston was the toads,” artist Claire Emery recalls with a laugh. “There were so many toads, and I was an avid toad collector. They would come out of their holes...
If you talk to a dozen ceramic artists throughout Montana, chances are good they’ll cite three reasons for the state’s unique ceramics community: the landscape, the people, and “The Bray.” In a state as vast in area as it is sparse in population, the existence...