I’ve been to this little slice of heaven many times. I didn’t make it this year, so thought I needed to make a painting of it instead. I honestly don’t think I needed any references as I know the place very well. It’s a relatively small subalpine lake, a place few other hikers seem to go to, and maybe that’s why I like it. Often, I’d be all by myself here, camping in the trail crew area where the black-tails also hangout. Only the deer and myself in a place like this. Imagine!
The mountain in the background is Grand Peak, the notch seen just to the right of it Grand Pass, the trail on south to Cameron. It’s not orange rock, that’s my rendition of sunset. The slope on the left is what created Gladys Lake in the first place, glacial rocks plowing up the valley into various ponds. I just love these wet meadows, their meandering little seasonal streams, flower-covered meadows with outcrop rocks where trees have a dry enough foothold to grow. I’d bet that center little island with it’s stunted subalpine firs has been unchanged for centuries.
This painting is oil on canvas, 24″ x 18″ framed or not and is available on by Etsy Eifert Gallery. Email for more details if you want at larryeifert@gmail.com.
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This was painted with those painters whose work I love from a century ago. It’s not a fictional place – just a bit of pushing reality around a little. I solo day-hiked here two weeks ago and it definitely made an impression on me. How could it not? The layers and layers of subalpine fir, avalanche chutes and knife ridge lines were just so paintable. I could paint these places every day until I croak.
The scene before me was on Lilian Ridge in Olympic National Park, with Lilian Creek in the valley far below. As I walked along here, two Columbian black-tail deer showed up to question my right to be here. A painterly experience.
My heroes that have painted these places have remained constant through the years. I still enjoy seeing paintings by Albert Bierstadt, Gunnar Widforss and Carl Rungius. This painting can be traced to those guys, especially Rungius, who painted in Banff until he died at age 90. I’ve always thought of wilderness painting as an old-man’s game, mainly because there isn’t a swift and sure path to understanding how to do it. If you’re a young painter, it’s easy to get up there. Not so easy to understand how to paint it when you get there. How to paint luminous depth of huge landscapes crammed onto a small piece of linen cloth? It’s not easy. Maybe I’m getting there, maybe I’ll do some more.
Curious about the exact location of this, my reference place in Olympic National Park for this painting? It’s just 30 air miles from my studio in Port Townsend, WA.
Two new little oils of summer experiences. I think of them as a journal.
Olympic National Park (next to me here in Port Townsend) has 8 critters found only here – and nowhere else. It’s because the Olympics aren’t connected to any other mountains, so instead of species intermixing from other places, over time they evolved into new ones. The Olympic Chipmunk is especially obvious and a truly fun animal to paint. Perky, I’d call it.
This is available on my Etsy Gallery online. 7″x9″ framed as you see it.
And a Pika, oil on canvas. Pikas aren’t in the Olympic Mountains, but they sure are in the Cascades. This one was seen on Mt Rainier near Iceberg Lake. They collect grass and flowers, make little haystacks and save it for winter food. This painting, like the Chipmunk, is oil on canvas, 5″ x 7″ and framed as you see it. Shipping is free. This painting is available here.
We’ve been working out in the West End of the Olympics, but are back now so I can post a few new paintings.
20126-6-10, Wilson’s Warbler in Salmonberry shown here is available now on my Eifert Gallery on Etsy, Framed for $295, framed and shipping included. A choice of frames, gold or silver. Link here: https://eifertgallery.etsy.com/listing/4519691981
This beautiful bird was bathing in our pond, so I made a painting of it.
Below, “2026-6-4 Cascade” is a 9″x12″ oil, taken from spring runoff ‘cascades’ that are right up the hill from our studio. It’s just so typical of Olympic seasonal runoff cascades, big crashing impressive water, then gone as the snow melts.
Studio shot of Cascades showing my great place to paint. Lots of nature light, a deep forest right outside, and I’m appreciative of every inch.
See that wooden cedar breadboard on the wall with the snowshoe hare drawing on it? That was made by me in 1968 in my first studio/gallery in Waubaushene, Ontario Canada (population 321 in winter. The place was so small I painted on my fold-out bed. I was 21 and used to go to the post office using my husky team and a sled! There were two power poles there and I’d tie the team lead dog to one pole, the sled to the other. I couldn’t give ANY of them a chance to break loose or they’d be gone.
A note about my pricing. Everyone keeps saying how inexpensive these paintings are, but here’s the point. I get almost all the money, no gallery takes commission (which is 50% and sometimes more). So, I get the same as I would in a gallery, but the selling price is half. A $300 painting would sell for $600. AND, I get to meet all of you, a personal connection lost to gallery artists. It also opens up a group of people who want my work but usually can’t afford it. It’s a way of selling art I very much enjoy.
Thanks for reading this week. You can sign up for emails for these posts on my website at larryeifert.com.
Our Swainson’s Thrush is on the elderberry, a soft mix of elegance – at least I hope that’s how it turned out.
These new oils are part of my efforts to learn more about liquid mediums, mixes of various evil brews of linseed oil, driers and thinners. Oils are complicated – you almost have to be a chemist to mix this goop, but I’m getting there. It makes life easier for the brushes – and painter if I get it right. Problem is, there isn’t a ‘right’.
It’s a fairly complicated painting for only 9″x12″, so here’s a larger version.
This second painting came from a recent hike up the Dosewallips River in the eastern Olympic Mountains. This isn’t the actual river, but a side tributary carrying water from the Tunnel Creek divide. Falling Water, 9″x12″ includes this silver frame or a gold one, you pick. Outside measurements are 14″ x 17″. Spring runoff is happening at a very alarming rate this year and I wanted to remember it. This painting is available here on my Eifert Gallery site on Etsy.
And below is a similar painting that is now available, but it’s painted in acrylic on canvas instead of oil. Acrylic has served me well for everything from wall murals 90 feet long, to something like this, a 9″x12″ painting with a lot of controlled detail. It’s from a sketch I made in the Hoh Rain Forest, a backwater of the Hoh River. In winter, this is a wild and crazy river, bringing down entire old-growth trees to pile up against the shores in big logjams. The road is washed out often because of it, but then when summer comes it’s a very beautiful place – as you can see.
I just counted these little oils and it appears I’ve painted 35 of them in 2026. I must like doing it, or else I’m just goofed up on the paint fumes. I started these last fall in an effort to get a little better at oils, and I think I’m getting there.
These three are now available on my Eifert Gallery on Etsy, $125 each, framed as you see them here. Shipping is free. The gold frame is 7″x 9″ on the outside measurement. They’re all still available as of April 10, 2026.
This painting is now sold. Sorry.
As I’ve said, these are all sort of a journal of my experiences. We have Anna’s Hummingbirds here year-round, but recently here came this Rufous Hummingbird male soon followed by a mate. Bedlam on the feeders. So I made a painting of the male. That’s a LOT of feathers for such a little bird.
This second effort is a local trail in a local state park, a patch of old growth forest I always enjoy. Forests are so complicated and I enjoy figuring out how to simply them. This one I named ‘Dark Trail’. Here it is in the gallery.
These two square paintings are oil on canvas, outside frame measurements are both 8″x8″. Shipping is included. $125 each.
This last oil I called Sunset Trail, but it’s really the same trail a few hundred yards uphill from the painting above. Same size, same price as the other. Here’s the gallery link.
Thanks for reading this week. You can sign up for emails for these posts on my website at larryeifert.com.
In 2024, I was commissioned by the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe in Sequim, Wa to make a series of wayside panels for the Dungeness River Center. This is an interpretive center, exhibits and classrooms, for the wild and free Dungeness, one of the steepest watersheds in the country. The project went on half a year, but I never posted a word about it here. Too many other paintings to talk about, I guess – not to mention finding the time to even sit down to post them.
The Tribe asked me to make these outside panels so when the visitor center is closed, visitors still have a visual learning experience. The panels are around the building, but also along the Olympic Discovery Trail that passes nearby. This trail is also part of the Pacific Northwest National Scenic Trail from Glacier National Park to La Push WA on the Pacific Ocean.
I’m happy with the results. This place is centered around an old railroad bridge (Railroad Bridge Park) and the Tribe bought it, gaining back a bit of their original land they had for thousands of years. In the process, we got to know a rather amazing group of S’Klallam people – and learned a lot doing it. We both felt privileged to be involved.
You’ll see both English and S’Klallam languages on these. The Tribe has programs in the local schools teaching this ancient language, and we tried to blend the languages, especially on the species captions. I think it worked pretty well, although it was a real challenge to figure out a font that has all the characters. Try finding a ADA compliant font with a backwards question mark, or a word that means Belted Kingfisher!
There’s a lot more than just painting that goes into this stuff. I don’t do it all, but from the ground up there’s the concrete pad, an ADA-approved installation of the legs and frame that will last 30 years, the aluminum panel the image is etched on is made only in South Dakota. The entire Adobe Suite of software (usually 4 programs that I use to design it) makes it print-ready. Then a committee has to approve what is written and painted so that it’s an accurate story. The art seems a secondary bit of this, but it takes the most time, and without good art, what is this but a book-on-a-stick!
We tried something new on this panel (above), making the three insets from laser-cut plastic that can be traced with pencil or crayon. School groups can trace the image onto paper to take with them – sort of a hands-on approach to a visual object.
Dusty Humphries, an artisan at the Tribal carving shed (actually a huge new building, not a shed) allowed me in to photograph his work. A truely amazing place.
Lori Grinnell Greninger seemed to be all over this project, giving us help in many ways – and not just modeling her hat – which the building was modeled after.
This last panel has the only image not of my own art or photography. Thanks to John Gussman for the drone image. Also a great thanks to Kathy Steichen for recommending me to the Tribe for this project in the first place. After a lifetime of painting, these new challenges keep me young, and I’ve worked with Kathy on many projects now.
Thanks for reading this week. You can sign up for emails for these posts on my website at larryeifert.com.
Easy to understand my motivation for THIS painting. It’s spring, nature’s renewal, Two robins getting mud in along our pond’s edge so I suspect a nest – and the Indian plum has its early leaves on. I can’t locate the nest, but no big deal.
It’s a common method for me, that of seeing a story happening in nature, then making a painting to tell that story. In this one, I tried to make the robins feel like newly weds, unsure of what to do, unsure of how all this happens. Translating it into a believable painting takes some thought. Even the soft color values might translate into patience.
Below, this rough concept drawing below shows how I went about this. No details to speak of in the drawing, just blocky shapes around the page. There’s more direction here than might meet with understanding – like how the center of interest hits the perfect spot where the top of the nest will be, where those brilliant robin’s-egg blue eggs are. Or the two large triangular areas of nothingness, pulling the viewer’s eyes to that nest area.
This is an original oil painting on stretched linen canvas, varnished and ready to hang. The canvas is 18″x24″ and the 2 1/2″ silver museum frame goes with it, making the outside dimensions 23″ x 29″. As usual for this size, I’m offering it for $1300 plus shipping costs which will probably be standard UPS rates. I have a double box ready to go. If you’re interested in learning more, please email me at larry@larryeifert.com.
Thanks for reading this week. You can sign up for emails for these posts on my website at larryeifert.com.
A quick look on the left shows one of the other paintings, Royal Lake Trail, sitting in my tool area.
These are my most recent small oil studies, plus a few still available, all painted in the past couple of months. Some have been shown here before, some not. They’re all on canvas board and varnished. Painting sizes are all the same, 5″x7″. The outside frames measure 7″x9″. They are all framed as you see them here.
Downy Woodpecker
The idea process here was a tiny bird on a big tree. These little woodpeckers, only 6″ long weigh less than an ounce. They make great painterly subjects because the darker whites seem to change a bit with the seasons. This one was on the big Douglas-fir right outside our studio porch. Those are little wisps of old-man’s beard lichen in the upper corner.
Black-tailed Deer in Rosehips
Lots of Columbian black-tailed deer here. Walking on a local trail in Port Townsend, I became sort of lost in the masses of rose hips on the Nootka roses I was passing. Amazing colors this time of year (early spring), and in places the branches are starting to turn purplish red with spring flush of juice. When I got back in the studio I started playing around with some samples I broke off to take. She was in the thicket, too.
Red Squirrel
I’m greeted each morning by several of these little feisty squirrels as they await me to toss some sunflower seeds on the big tray feeder. Brazen little creatures, they’re not so easy to paint. In summer, they seem a bit more brown, winter coat is more gray – an adaptation to owl safety, maybe.
Royal Basin Trail above the Lake
Lots going on in this little painting, maybe because I didn’t want to leave the place lodged in my mind. This is a trail I’ve been on many times! It takes the hiker up past Royal Lake and into a truly sensational alpine area. Surrounded by some of the tallest peaks in the Olympic Mountains, I have wandered here wishing I’d just become a marmot so I wouldn’t have to leave. I tend to paint these trail images from memory, often in winter when I can’t get there physically.
House Finch
House finches have this odd way of looking down their beaks, as if they’re twisting sideways to see better. It’s almost like they’re judging me. But just try to paint one doing this. Not sure I got it correct, but I liked the colors a lot. That’s Carmine Lake paint, by the way, a color not to be forgotten.
When it fell, this was probably the biggest alder we have have here – and it was already dead when it collapsed of rot and time. I was looking at it not long ago and noticed how nicely the log was providing nest holes and insects for the birds – and so I painted this little story-painting about it. The chickadee really was there, bouncing around the new plants growing on the log’s top.
These are all priced like the others at $95 each, framed. Shipping will be USPS and will add a bit more, but the cost of shipping is fairly low. Email me if you’re interested in knowing more. larryeifert@gmail.com
You might have missed the other posts of these little oils, but I’ve been doing these to test different mixes of medium, linseed oil, thinner and driers like cobalt and Liquin. I’m still not ‘there’ yet with it, but making these small paintings has been very fun for me – and having painted full-time for so many decades now, I find it amazing it can still feel fresh. So, I’m continuing on with new efforts.
Green Rock is an oil on canvas painting, now available. The canvas is 30″ x 40″ on stretched canvas. It is big enough I thought I’d sell it without the frame, so someone could buy it unstretched, rolled in a tube with the stretcher bars ready to go. We can talk about it.
Below is the painting in a frame, just so you can see what it looks like. I don’t have this frame at the moment, but go ahead and ask.
Where is this place?
The painting is, of course, about salmon (not the green rock). But in these big canvases I find great enjoyment in hiding stuff and telling stories – so how many salmon can YOU find?
I’ve seen many salmon along the Sol Duc River, mostly in Olympic National Park. I even have outdoor exhibit panels there telling the Sol Duc Coho salmon’s story. It’s a special place for both Nancy and me, a place many paintings have been hatched (to use a salmon word). In fact, counting up how many paintings Olympic National Park owns of mine of the Sol Duc Valley: 17! (including one with Nancy in it) Most of them are in a vault at the main visitor center in Port Angeles, so even I can’t see them. All were used for exhibits and reproduced.
If you’d like to find out more about this painting, or if it’s still available, write me at larryeifert@gmail.com.
This is a link to our new Esty store online with some of the available originals.
