Tag Archives: Olympic

Murals

The Hoh Rainforest Visitor Center – sketches

Both photos enlarge with a click.

As if our Malheur NWR project wasn’t enough, this week I launched into a new project – and for once it’s local. I’m painting somewhere around 340 sq feet of paintings in 15 panels for one of my favorite places. The Hoh River Rain Forest here in our county, but it’s all the way on the far side of the park and takes hours to get there. For awhile, a representation of it will live in our studio. The drawings are almost finished and the fun ready to begin.

Top photo: This is a pretty complex painting, so I used my own photos to piece something together to start the process. This actually wraps around onto four walls; the bottom is the underground area, a railing with forest floor above that, and then an upper canopy area disjointed from the rest. Complex might be an understatement.

I was thrilled to get this commission since this is one of our favorite places. Countless times we’ve hiked the River Trail – the direct pipeline to Mount Olympus. We’ve camped here, watched elk fight it out for their lovers, found the ‘One Square Inch of Silence’ (Google it). Below is Nancy at the beginning of that famous trail. I first hiked here in 1978 – who would have thought that 40 years later I would get to paint a big mural here.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web. And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of stunning photography

And here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

Alpineglow

Another painting in my ‘Trail Series’. When I was growing up the word ‘alpenglow’ was like an elixir, something akin to magic. For Mid-western flat-landers who only experienced these places on rare occasions, I vividly remember the few times we finally got up there in the Porcupines or Rockies. My parents knew how to do it, to stay late, wait for sundown when the light came – and later drive down the hill in growing darkness. For Virginia, it was as close to  god as it gets.

I now live where I can see this easily, but not all THAT easily. We still have to work for it with a hike, but that elixir is still there when we arrive, that ‘magic-time’ photographer Galen Rowell always spoke of. So, this little painting is one of my favorite ‘alpineglow’ places, right up the hill from home in the Dungeness watershed of the Olympics. At sunset, it’s a place I’d rather be than just about anywhere.

This ORIGINAL painting is acrylic on board, 6″ x 9″ and $149 framed. Outside edge of the frame is about 12″ x 15″.
This custom frame has a triple liner and glass. Shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone. This is the original painting, NOT a print.
Email us for details.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web. And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of beautiful photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

A Flash of Red in the Forest


Sold 

A little flash of red as the downy goes by, carefully checking each bark break for a possible morsel.  It was just outside my studio window, so, I stuck him in a painting.

We have lots of woodpeckers, flickers and sapsuckers here in our forest. I think they all make great subjects to paint, but this little guy, the smallest of them all, provides me with great entertainment as well. Downy Woodpeckers are only a little over six inches long, palm-sized, and seem to prefer mixed forests, meaning hardwood and confers mixed together – which is exactly what we have. In nearby Fort Townsend State Park just a mile away, a beautiful patch of lowland old-growth conifers of huge size, nary a downy is seen.

This ORIGINAL painting is acrylic on board, 6″ x 9″ and $149 framed. Outside edge of the frame is about 12″ x 15″.
This custom frame has a triple liner and glass. Shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone. This is the original painting, NOT a print.
Email us for details if you’re interested.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web. And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of beautiful photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

Golden Path – a new painting

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Going through some old photos in trip journals, I ran across this photo of a local trail in June. It’s February right now, and this place, not 30 miles from  here up in the Heather Creek area of the upper Dungeness Valley is currently beneath a lot of snow. Still, my heart yearned to be there right now, hiking along and looking at the trail flowers – yes, there IS a flower called a trail flower.

So, with all that in my mind’s eye, this little painting arrived.

And here it is framed.

This ORIGINAL painting is acrylic on board, 6″ x 9″ and $149 framed. Outside edge of the frame is about 12″ x 15″.
This custom frame has a triple liner and glass. Shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone. This is the original painting, NOT a print.
Email us for details.

Thanks for reading this week. Send this to someone who might appreciate what I’m painting and tell them to sign up. I’m trying to expand my list. An email will work.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web. And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of beautiful photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

Short Drop – a new painting

Sorry, it’s sold.

Short Drop, a painting that could be a million places in the Olympic Mountains and North Cascades. If you live in the Northwest, you know this place, and countless others like it. We hike favorite trails in winter, mainly because they’re tourist-free and often find these seasonal streams, but come summer there will be no such thing – many times not even looking like it ever had water flowing there.

But now when I stood there next to it? I could look at it for hours, listening to the Short Drop of falling water.

What do I get out of this? I like studying the situation, how the water leaves the ‘lip’ and begins its fall – that critical moment of drop. In these little waterfall paintings, that very spot almost always become the center-of-interest, the place on the canvas our eyes are drawn too like a magnet. It did for you, I hope, when you first looked at this. The rest of it, the foam, sticks and little leaves are all supporting characters helping that lead actor do its job.

This ORIGINAL painting is acrylic on board, 6″ x 9″ and $149 framed. Outside edge of the frame is about 12″ x 15″.
This custom frame has a triple liner and glass. Shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone. This is the original painting, NOT a print.
Email us for details if you’re interested. These little painting go quickly – just sayin’.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web. And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of beautiful photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

Red-breasted Sapsucker – Hoh Rain Forest

We were hiking the Spruce Trail at the Hoh Rain Forest a couple of months ago, no people – winter had arrived. Then a brilliant flash of  red, a sapsucker landed right in front of us on the trail not ten feet from us, just sat there. After a bit it began jumping around, looking at us as if trying to explain something, but who knows what – we’re not good at sapsucker-lingo. This went on for a good amount of time, and then, as if finally giving up on us, it few off down the trail. We followed, and here it was again, repeating the same routine. I’ve never had the chance to spend as much time with one of these fairly rare birds – it was intriguing.

I’m fairly well convinced that we’re not the only smart things on this planet, if we are at all. There are complex goings-on that, mainly because of our arrogance, we’re missing. I would have loved to have spent time here with this little colorful bird and learned from it, but, alas, we knew not where to begin, so instead I just stupidly sat there with my mouth agape while Nancy clicked away. At least I can paint something in memory of the experience.

This ORIGINAL painting is acrylic on board, 6″ x 9″ and $149 framed. Outside edge of the frame is about 12″ x 15″.
This custom frame has a triple liner and glass. Shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone. This is the original painting, NOT a print.
Email us for details.

SOLD

Thanks for reading this week. Send this to someone who might appreciate what I’m painting and tell them to sign up. I’m trying to expand my list. An email will work.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web. And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of beautiful photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

Curving Around The Little Tarn

Click to enlarge.

A new painting today. Seems like each Fall I go into this frenzy of painting alpine images, of trails and water, mountains and meadows – of places I wish I still was. There will be more, I promise. I really like the solid feel this trail has, as if summer dust is inches deep. With a summer like the one we’ve had, I sure needed to include dust. Nancy and I went up a trail a couple of weeks ago that wasn’t the most pleasant – too hot, too much weight, maybe too old for too hot and heavy – but I’m not complaining. It was paradise for both of us.

This ORIGINAL painting is acrylic on board, 6″ x 9″ and $145 framed, my price before it gets to the gallery. Outside edge of the frame is about 12″ x 15″.
This custom frame has a triple liner and glass. Shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone. This is the original painting, NOT a print. I have other frames.
Email us for details.

This is one of those ‘little tarns’ in the Olympic Mountains. A favorite of mine, because you can see the purity of its evolution, how the snow pocket to the right might have been another of these, or one in the process of being born. The little lake has a life that’s entire directed by the little rock ledge that creates a nice little waterfall. Eventually, the falls will erode the rock, the lake will vanish into a meadow.

Thanks for reading this week. Send this to someone who might appreciate what I’m painting and tell them to sign up. I’m trying to expand my list. An email will work.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web. And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of rather amazing photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

Sunset Hike – an original acrylic painting

Sunset Hike – click to enlarge

I did this painting a couple of months ago, but it never made it to the blog here, so . . .

I was by myself, coming back from a day in the Upper Royal Basin meadows and walking down to meet Nancy at the campsite.  I came through a bit of open space in the meadows on the bench below Royal Lake.  I’ll bet some of you know this area where the first good campsites await after a bunch of miles on that hot upslope trail.

The late-afternoon light was just blasting through these trees and really lighting up the grass – like spotlights were back in the silver firs. I was just spending way too much energy admiring it when I tripped on a rock, and down I went into the grass. Good time to get the camera out, and this painting is what happened later.

It’s such a sweet memory of a great experience that I’m keeping it for myself, and THAT doesn’t happen very often.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web.  And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of beautiful photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

Brown Creeper – Going Down

Brown-Creeper

Easily one of my favorite LBJ’s (little brown jobs). This is a brown creeper, a bug-eating specialist that hangs out fairly consistently in our little forest here in Port Townsend. It never visits the feeders, but instead carefully searches tree trunks for a next bug-meal – usually on the biggest trees they can find. Nuthatches usually spiral DOWN tree trunks, while creepers often pass them as they go up, picking off the insects the nuthatches miss. Once at the top, they fly to the bottom of the next tree and start it all over again. I show this guy going down, and of course they’d do this too occasionally just looking at their scenery the other direction. I just had this view in my mind of its compact little body upended.

Brown-Creeper-framed

This ORIGINAL painting is acrylic on board, 6″ x 9″ and $145 framed. Outside edge of the frame is about 12″ x 15″.
This custom frame has a triple liner and glass. Shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone. This is the original painting, NOT a print.
Email us if you’d like it hanging on YOUR wall instead of mine.

Yuming-Yang-commission

And the answer to last week’s question: where is this?

Not a single person guessed the answer to my question last week of where the coastal scene was. Lots of guesses that included several states, but no one thought that is was made up. The idea was to paint a place that ‘feels’ like Olympic NP, has river, ocean, seastacks, mountains and old-growth. Got’m all, it’s just nowhere that’s real.

Thanks for reading this week. Send this to someone who might appreciate what I’m painting and tell them to sign up. I’m trying to expand my list. An email will work.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web.And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of beautiful photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.

New Painting Post

Where Is This? A Little Travel Quiz

Yuming-Yang-commission

Private commission, sold. Click the image and it’ll enlarge in your browser.

This week it’s a test for those Northwest-Coast-hikers and lovers of all things rainforest and wilderness coast. Where is this? Big wild beach, sea stacks, big river coming down from snow-covered mountains, old-growth forest. Nope, not Canada. There are some tiger lilies, a few lupine and false soloman seal to round it out. But where is it? Get it right and I’ll send you a free park jigsaw puzzle of your choice.

 

This is a commission for a buyer of mine who lives in Texas. Used to live here in the Seattle area, loves the Northwest, but is now stuck in a place so unlike the Northwest he’s been purchasing my paintings to remind him where his heart really is. Thanks, Yuming, it was a lot of fun.

And thanks for reading this week. Send this to someone who might appreciate what I’m painting and tell them to sign up. I’m trying to expand my list. An email will work.
Larry Eifert

Here’s the blog on the web.And here’s my Facebook fan page. I post lots of other stuff there.

Click here to go to our main website – with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive portfolios and lots of other stuff.

Nancy’s web portfolio of beautiful photographs

And Click here to go to Virginia Eifert’s website. Her books are now becoming available as Amazon Kindle books.