Born and raised in Whitefish, Montana, painter Nate Closson has always been enthralled with the state’s beauty. His art is a tribute, a way to reignite appreciation for the region’s landscapes and lifestyles. “This whole world is beautiful, but nowhere more so than Montana,” Closson says....
There’s nothing Mary Roberson could be but an artist, though it seems she was the last to know. “The art field picked me; I didn’t pick it,” she says. “I have vivid memories in first grade of drawing my fellow classmates — not because I...
I’ve been making assemblage work for 50 years,” says Stephen Glueckert, an artist and educator based in Missoula, Montana. “But I draw, and I paint, and I play music, and, to me, the older I’ve gotten, the less I see lines between these things. I...
No distractions, no schedule, nobody barging into your space. That’s the beauty of an artist-in-residence program. Admittedly, it’s not for everybody, but those who do take a deep dive into creativity seldom regret it. Across the state, programs vary in the amount of time, type of...
When gallery-goers encounter one of Caleb Meyer’s landscapes of the Mountain West, they tend to stop in their tracks, transfixed by the feelings of wonder conveyed by the painter. His recent piece, Full of Life, presents an outstanding example of that phenomenon. Certainly, the size of...
Art is ubiquitous. Or more to the point, beautiful scenes, precious moments, wondrous animals, stirring events — they are all around us, and the works inspired by these elements abound. As Whitefish, Montana artist Nate Closson (page 146) says, “This whole world is beautiful. …...
During summer afternoons in the Northern Rockies, it’s nearly impossible not to ponder what writer Rick Bass calls “the power of spaciousness.” Cumulus clouds shift within a cerulean sky, their shapes illuminated by gentle rays of sunshine, casting darkened shadows on the ground. Somewhere, a...
He was the quintessential Montanan, I think. That is to say, the landscape shaped him, as it shapes all of us fortunate enough to be here in this eyeblink of time. Sometimes his music sounded like the first crack in an ice dam — that first...
U.S. Forest Service fire lookouts have one of the loneliest occupations on earth. Perched atop remote peaks across the West, we spend summer days in monk-like observation, eyes roaming timbered landscapes, watching the horizon for impending storms and wisps of smoke. When I was 24,...
Editor’s Note: Retrieving antlers on public land remains a balance between opportunity, access, safety, and conservation. Last year, the Wyoming Legislature created a resident-only season on select public lands during the first week of May, with nonresidents who purchase a conservation stamp allowed after May...