Tag Archives: Trails

Murals

Welcome to Sol Duc Valley

Since this wayside panel is being printed this month, I thought I’d pass it on here. I published another one of these back on November 8th, and you can see it here. For this project, I painted 21 paintings for 3 panels at Olympic National Park’s Sol Duc Valley entry kiosk. With the others last year, that makes 24 images you can see while driving the 17 miles from national park gate to road’s end where a trail leads to this grand waterfall – Sol Duc Falls. At 4′ x 6′, these are pretty large panels.

So what? Well, I like to call these efforts “public art galleries in our parks”, and I now have hundreds of these things in parks, preserves and wildlife refuges around the West. You’re hiking or driving along, and suddenly there’s a piece of art and a small story to tell you, or interpret, what you’re seeing. It’s just a great way to experience a beautiful place, and, I hope, to heighten your experience beyond what nature is providing (if that’s possible). These panels don’t use the original art itself, but are always fabricated out of fiberglass, stainless steel or a Formica product, so they’ll probably last longer than I will. I’d like to image someone coming along decades from now and stumbling over one of these things – and having it enhance their day.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Click here to go to our main website – packed with jigsaw puzzles, prints and other stuff.

Click here to check out what Nancy’s currently doing.

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of our email group – or just ‘talk’ with us.

New Painting Post

Riverside Red Alders

I’m still whacking away on the bristlecone painting for Crater Lake Institute, but here’s something I did yesterday just for the pleasure of it. If you click the image, it should enlarge. If not, just go to the blog. I have more of these, but my web server has been ‘migrating’, so the blog has been shut down this week. Just what ‘migrating’ means, I’m not sure, but I wish I was doing some of that myself. Avalanche warnings are up in the mountains already.

For those reading from other parts of the planet besides the Northwest, red alder is a common lowland tree found in moist Northwest stream-side forests. They often appear after logging to revitalize trashed-out land and conveniently add nitrogen to the soil by ‘fixing’ it from the air. Our woods are full of them, so I know the tree well. In fact, there’s currently a red-alder log in the fire as I write this. It’s a very beautiful tree to paint because of the gray and brown, speckled patchwork trunk patterns. There are other alders, but this one has a sure identifier. The edges of each leaf curl under slightly right along the edges – a little fact that most field guides don’t tell you.

This original acrylic painting is varnished on linen canvas, 9″ x 12″ and $140 unframed.
The gold frame makes it a total of $180 and shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone or if you take the frame. This is the original, NOT a print.
Email us for details.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Click here to go to our main website – packed with jigsaw puzzles, prints and other stuff.

Click here to check out what Nancy’s currently doing on her blog and website. Pretty interesting stuff on the blog.

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of our email family – or just ‘talk’ with us.

You can also leave comments on the blog here. Every little bit helps me understand how to be a better painter.

New Painting Post

Late Afternoon – Lillian Ridge Trail

Lillian-Ridge

SOLD
Obstruction Point area, Olympic National Park.
Acrylic on linen canvas – a small easel painting this time.

This trail is a favorite – I can’t paint it enough. It’s about 35 miles, as the eagle flies, west of our studio in the eastern Olympic Mountains – a serious set of rocks. I painted another version this last spring and posted it here in March. It’s not the amazing scenery or that it’s an almost level trail (well, that might be part of it), but it’s also the fact that, at over 6000′, it’s above any glaciation that’s ever occurred there. To walk here is to trod on the exact same stones and sit on the very same overlook that the mammoth hunters did during the last Ice Age. The shattered shale that crunches under my boots is unchanged, and I could very probably be the very NEXT person since that Pliocene hunter to sit on that rock and look for Olympic marmots, those alpine animals that are only found here. The only difference might be that it would have been the hunter’s dinner and not mine.

For an artist that wishes nature were a bit less mild these days, that wishes he were born a few years earlier so he could have seen more of our now-vanished legacy, this is heady stuff.

This ORIGINAL painting is varnished acrylic on linen canvas, 9″ x 12″ and $140 unframed.
The gold frame makes it a total of $170 and shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone or if you take the frame. This is the original painting, NOT a print.
Email us for details.

Still working on the bristlecone painting, but painting in the boatyard (our boat) has gotten in the way.

Thanks for reading this week. For new readers, I try to alternate between park interpretive stuff and easel paintings, but they’re all about nature. It’s what I’ve done for over 40 years.

Larry Eifert

Click here to go to our main website – packed with jigsaw puzzles, prints, interpretive art and other stuff.

Click here to check out what Nancy’s currently doing with her photography.

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of these emails – or just ‘talk’ with us.

You can also leave comments on the blog here. Every little bit helps me understand how to be a better painter.

***previous*** — ***next***

New Painting Post

Elwha River at the old Humes Ranch

I’ve painted two large murals of the Elwha River for Olympic National Park, and so in the interest of science, art and fun, of course we had to hike up the river to check it out. We’ve backpacked up this valley several times in the last two seasons. The Humes Ranch area is only a few miles from the trailhead, but its scenic beauty would be worth miles more. As someone said, this is a big messy river, with snags and piles of old-growth trees strewn along its shores. We’ve camped here several times, right on the grassy knoll above the rocks here, taking in the vastness of this place as the sun sets behind the peaks. This is what Western National Parks are all about, experiencing wildness that used to be taken for granted, but isn’t any more.

Oh, and Humes Ranch used to be here prior to the park’s creation. In fact, the oldest building in the park, the old ranch house, was just restored just up the slope. The only livestock left today are the bears, deer and elk.

This ORIGINAL painting is varnished acrylic on linen canvas, 9″ x 12″ and $140 unframed.
The gold frame makes it a total of $180 and shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone or if you take the frame. This is the original, NOT a print.
Email us for details.

To check availability of the other small originals I’ve blogged about the past few weeks, check the blog here.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Click here to go to our main website – packed with jigsaw puzzles, prints and other stuff.

Click here to check out what Nancy’s currently doing.

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of our email family – or just ‘talk’ with us.

New Painting Post

Bagley Creek Meadows


Bagley Creek is what you’d call the perfect “river runs through it” stream. It meanders out of a high alpine lake and into this narrow glaciated valley past basaltic cliffs and meadows. Our trail was along the west bank – the morning sun casting long shadows on the far cliffs. Nanc and I could have sat in these meadows for hours, listening to the bumblebees making slow passes on September pearly everlastings and watching a northern harrier canvas the grass for mice. On the slopes above these meadows, blueberries were everywhere, and with the warming sun each one turned into a little berry tart.

There’s a favorite essay of mine by Virginia Eifert (yah, mom) who wrote “I stand by the river and I know that it has been here yesterday and will be here tomorrow and that therefore, since I am part of its pattern today, I also belong to all its yesterdays and will be part of all its tomorrows. This is a kind of earthly immortality, a kinship with rivers and hills and rocks, with all things and all creatures that have ever lived or ever will live or have their being on the earth. It is my assurance of an orderly continuity in the great design of the universe.”

This ORIGINAL painting is varnished acrylic on linen canvas, 9″ x 12″ and $140 unframed. If you’d like to add the gold frame, that makes it a total of $180 and shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone or if you take the frame.
Sonja (who bought one of these small paintings) says I need to say this: This is an original painting, NOT a print. Email us for details. To check availability of the other small originals I’ve blogged about the past few weeks, check the blog here.

SOLD

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Click here to go to our main website – packed with jigsaw puzzles, prints and other stuff.

Click here to check out what Nancy’s currently doing.

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of our email family – or just ‘talk’ with us.

New Painting Post

Black-tailed Deer – Port Townsend Trail

Eifert_Deer_Larry_Scott

Just west of our marina and downtown Port Townsend, an old railroad grade goes along the bay before turning inland. This is now a public trail, part of the great Northwest Trail that goes from Cape Avala, west of here, all the way to Glacier National Park in Montana – three states and 1200 miles away. And while it’s a hiking trail like the John Muir, Pacific Crest or Appalachian Trails, here you have to climb on our ferry for a few miles to keep going east.

Coming into town, there’s one place under the bluffs where, late in the afternoon, black-tailed deer like to congregate. You eyes focus on the marvelous views ahead and they often miss the fact you’re being watched yourself – but Port Townsend deer are pretty tame, having been raised from birth on the garden roses, apples and all manor of tasty plants carefully bought and planted by the locals.

This is a larger painting today. This ORIGINAL painting is varnished acrylic on archival board, 14″ x 10″ and $650 unframed. If you’d just like the painting framed, that makes it a total of $690 and shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone or if you take the frame. This is an ORIGINAL painting, NOT a print. Email us for details.

To check the availability of the other originals I’ve blogged about the past few weeks, check the blog here and go down the listings.
Thanks for reading this week.
Larry EifertClick here to go to our main website – packed with jigsaw puzzles, prints and other stuff.

Click here to check out what Nancy’s currently doing.

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of our email family – or just ‘talk’ with us.

***previous*** — ***next***

New Painting Post

Easy Trail

Easy-Trail-framed

SOLD

Level, easy and hopefully endless. Now, that’s my idea of a trail. It meandered through ferns for awhile, then came out into this glade filled with false lily-of-the-valley and scattered trillium. All these flowers had long faded, but no matter, it was just a nice place to be. Filtered sunlight came through the upper canopy, casting strong shadows behind the tree trunks. And, as usual for me, I thought this seemed like a good place for a painting.

So here it is – the Easy Trail. It’s always my hope that paintings, like photography, can bring something fresh to eyes that will never see it. It’s my joy to say that, indeed, I saw, and now you have too.

This original painting is varnished acrylic on linen canvas, 9″ x 12″ and $140 unframed. This is an original, not a print.
The gold frame makes it a total of $180 and shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone or if you take the frame.
Email us for details.

This one, like several others this month, won’t be listed on the main website, but will be only on the blog.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Click here to go to our main website – packed with jigsaw puzzles, prints and other stuff.

Click here to check out what Nancy’s currently doing.

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of our email family – or just ‘talk’ with us.

 

***previous*** — ***next***

New Painting Post

On the Trail to Lake Ann

SOLD

Last week we took our little ferry (locally named Bob, because that’s what it does best) over to Whidbey Island, then drove inland a couple of hours to the North Cascades and Mount Baker. This trail is so high it was still spring, with lupine, columbine and paintbrush everywhere. At one point, there was enough fireweed in bloom to make a scree slope completely magenta. We crossed a side creek by hopping rocks, and I stopped to take a reference snapshot of this scene looking upstream into the glacial bowl. The contrast between blue-sky reflection in the foreground, and the yellow sun-bounced light off distant trees makes for a very interesting scene, doesn’t it?

These little digital cameras have really improved how I can do these paintings. Before, I’d have to stop, pull apart my pack to get at my 35mm, go back and figure the shot out – and then wouldn’t know until I processed the film if the stuff was any good. Now, I pull the camera from my pocket and simply take a bunch of shots – and review them as I go (just like you do too). What’s interesting is that my painting process is still the same. The painting, the end result of all this, always looks very different from the beginning reference shot. I guess I’m not really trying to improve on nature, just rearrange it.

We liked this area so much, we’re going back this weekend for some more trail-miles. Might even result in another painting!

This painting is varnished acrylic on linen canvas, 9″ x 12″ and $140 unframed.
The gold frame makes it a total of $180 and shipping adds just a bit more depending on your zone or if you take the frame.
Email us for details.
This one isn’t going on the main website, but will be only on the blog.

Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert

Click here to go to our main website – packed with jigsaw puzzles, prints and other stuff.

Click here to check out what Nancy’s currently doing.

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of our email family – or just ‘talk’ with us.

New Painting Post

Lillian Ridge – Olympic National Park

Lillian Ridge Trail
To the west of Port Townsend, Olympic National Park fills our skyline. This trail begins at road’s end, over 6000′, at what we hear is the highest road in the state of Washington. It meanders along the ridgetop with amazing views on all sides for miles. To the east, the narrow chasm of Grand Valley shows hints of lakes and waterfalls. To the west, the Mt Olympus complex fills the view. This is Mt McCartney in the distance as one hikes south along the ridgetop spine, often through acres of endemic wildflowers.

This mountaintop has never been glaciated, so walking here means walking in the same footsteps as prehistoric man. I keep looking for mastodons, or at least their tracks.

We have eight-color Giclee prints either unframed or framed, between $39.95 and $239.95 available of this painting and the original painting is available for $700 unframed. Email us.

Link here to the Lilian Ridge print on our website

Or, you can go to our Giclee Print Index here

Or, send us an email to opt in or out of our email family – or just ‘talk’ with us.