This is a painting of the Maroon Bells south of Aspen, Colorado that I did several years ago and have dug out to do some revamping. It reads a lot better than it did.
11"x14" Oil Painting

I think I have finished this Oil Painting, 16"x20". After looking at it for a week or so I may do some touchup but for now...

Spring is so long in coming to the high country and I have posted my observations of that fact on my latest OUTDOOR ADVENTURES blog.

The finished painting framed and ready for the auction. It is a 11"x22" image size, Gouache Watercolor. The auction was very slow and I was a little dissapointed in the results for all the artists. Sales were OK for the silent auction miniatures but prices were way down. First time in years I did not have a sellout of those paintings. This economy is scarey.
My gallery pardner also participated as did gallery artist, Dan Andrews. I will be posting more pictures on the gallery blog. Silversage Gallery.

Last night was the annual Petroleum Club of Casper show which featured a Quickdraw event where each artist participating has one hour to complete a painting which is then auctioned off. The artist receives 50% of the proceeds.
Yep. Thats me working on my piece.

This morning I was up befor dawn and drove up to the Glacier trailhead photographing a beautiful morning that included watching Bighorn Sheep through my binoculars and watching and photographing a zillion Mule Deer. By 8:00 am I was back home crossing the bridge into my yard when I spotted this Mule Deer doe getting a quick drink from the river. Best picture of the day was from my very own yard. Go figure.

Hallett Peak 14"x18" Oil Painting.
Back at work I have finished this Colorado scene of Hallett Peak located in Rocky Mountain National Park

After two weeks of pretty intensive work on the gallery doing some construction, and rehanging we are open and back to painting. I have even been back to Montana earlier this week and yep. got to visit again with the barking pig.
Tammy caught Tom and myself in our corners by the front window painting away. I have posted a number of photos of the gallery and our new additions and preparations for the season in the Silver Sage Gallery blog accessed from this site. Hope you will check it out and see what is new.

I finally have the Wilderness Art Challenge blog up and running. Hope you will check it out and participate.
Now I gotta' get mine painted.

I am not going to get much painting done for a few days as we are in the process of getting the gallery open for the season. Tom and Tammy are back from the Arizona show and are rehanging their gallery wall. Today we rehung Tom's wall and mine. Tomorrow we will begin work on rehanging other artists. We are moving things around a little and building a new Bronze display shelf which will be pretty nice. What with rehanging and some new touch ups it will give the Gallery a fresh look for the season. In spite of snow falling outside and winter storm warnings for tomorrow we even had a few folks in.

By popular demand here is Rudy the barking pig. The wagon is one my folks had at the ranch that we used to neighbor in [for the most part]when I was just a little fellow. It was miles to a neighbor made closer by this horse pulled freight wagon. it had been in early stages of disrepair and I had begun to try and restore it when Clay, my son-in-law took it upon himself to finish the job.

I asked my daughter to send me a picture of the fountain with the cowboy. I will ahve to ask her where this is installed as I don't know. The one I had seen featured this cowboy [smaller version]with a bronze background of waterfalls over rocks and water pouring out over the hat back into a small pool that the horse was standing in. I had not seen this particular one.

I took this photo outside the shop of another monument sized bronze by D Michael Thomas. Unfinished it depicts an old time cowboy who has reached down into a pool of water to fill his hat with water for a drink. Water will drip out of his hat back into the pool. It is designed to be a fountain if you will with the horse standing in the pool and water continually running. A background of rock and a falls accompany the bronze. I have seen one of these set up and it is quite impressive. As you can see I am accompanied by Mitze who considers herself extremely important. The kids have several dogs and a pot bellied pig who all run out to greet you. The pig thinks he is barking along with the others and seems quite excited about everything.

This is a small version[maquette]of the monument-not yet put together nor patinaed.

The bronze monument will have a guitar as a base that the bucking horse and rider will be set on. It is over 6 feet tall.

Back from our little trip to Frannie, Wyoming and into Montana. We took our daughter, husbsnd and son out to celebrate her 41st Birthday which involved a 120 mile round trip drive to Red Lodge, Montana for the event. Next day we were in Billings for business then back to Frannie. Vicki was set up by our daughter, Janet for a checkup at the Lovell, Wyoming hospital where she runs the emergency room as well as working as a surgical nurse. Small hospitals require a do-it-all for nurses. With that under our belts we did the return trip running into a wonderful snow storm on the way home. Snowed all day yesterday and this morning our spring temperature was +6 degrees.
Our son-in-law runs a finishing studio which is a large shop where he does welding and patina work on bronzes. I took a few pictures of his current project which is a monument of Chris Ledoux, the famous world champion Bronc rider and western-country singer who died way befor his time of cancer. The bronze is by D Michael Thomas who uses Clay to do all his bronze work. This bronze is over 15 feet tall and will be installed in Kaycee, Wyoming which is where Chris was from. It is being financed by the Ledoux family. Quite an undertaking.

I am off to Montana till mid week so I too will be busy getting to this Shira Moose. How about the month of April to do our Moose. Being as how I have a lot of comments and e-mails concerning this endeavor-I do believe I will add a new Blog covering my Wilderness and Wildlife Challenges. That should be fun and interesting.

CHALLENGE
I thought being as I am about to get real busy with opening the gallery and have to go to Montana for the next 4 or 5 days beginning sunday-this would be a good time to offer a new Wildlife Art challenge of this Cow Moose I took last spring. Thought it might be fun to work on a backlit animal. So have at it. I have posted it to a size that by clicking onto it-you can copy a large image of this old girl. When you are finished I hope you will send me a copy of your art to post on my blog as we did with the Bighorn Ram. If this goes like it seems to be going I am going to have to begin a new blog. It is fun though to put everyones submission together just to see how everyone interpretes what I am posting.

HALLETT PEAK
16"x20" Oil Painting
This view of Hallett Peak is from the road to Bear Lake. In modern times you must take a bus to get to the Lake. It is a case where the area has been loved to death and now they are trying to control access to this area. It is a very beautiful area with some great hikes into Loch Vale and west into the lakes immediately below Hallett. Another day or two I should be finished with both this painting as well as the Moraine Park painting.

In the past week while I have been working on my Deer painting I have worked on several other Oils while the deer was drying. This is a view across Moraine Park in Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado. As a teenager our pastor had a cabin on Fall River at the edge of Estes Park and we often went there for a week at a time. I had the opportunity to explore Rocky Mountain and later as newly married, my brother, the friend we grew up with and our wives were still able to stay in the cabin. What a life. In more recent years I had the opportunity to illustrate a guidebook on the park. An endeavor I am really proud of. I still love painting the area. Across Moraine Park, 15"x20" Oil Painting

Worked more on my Deer painting today. Blocking in the deer even more and the sagebrush to the point where I think I want most of it put. I did go back in and enlarge the buck. He just looked too small. Now wondering if the deer immediately behind him are a little too small looking? I had been comparing him with the ones at the bottom and the Doe at the top. Will have to go a ways on the painting and then decide.

Back to my Deer painting today. Worked on the Sagebrush on the left side and have begun blocking in the Deer

I intended to get back to work on my Deer painting today but this morning I finished up my watercolor and then did some gallery work in anticipation of our opening for the season in the next couple of weeks and finished the afternoon off by posting my latest outdoor adventure on my OUTDOOR ADVENTURE blog. Hope you will take the time to go over and take a look at it. After my saturday morning venture I just may have to do a few more stream-snow paintings.

I finished the tree and foreground on my Gouache and put the final touches in the foreground. it is a Gouache Watercolor painting 10 3/4"x19 1/2".
If anyone has ever driven Interstate 80 across southern Wyoming you drive by the Snowy Range and Elk Mountain towards Rawlins, Wyoming. It is a 100 mile drive and very picturesque in summer but a "Wish I had never seen this place" in the winter. We have always refered to it as the Snow Chi Ming Trail being that the interstate through here was built during the Viet Nam war. The mountain in the background is Elk Mountain.

I must be having an Oil painting block as yesterday I could not seem to get enthused enough to work on my Deer painting so I went to my watercolors and began this 11"x20" Gouache Watercolor on 300#Arches Watercolor paper. Got the background in and the middle trees along with the Hay meadow started. I plan to have a big old Cottonwood coming up from the foreground that will work perfectly to give me some verticle to all the horizontal I have going on. This is a scene from the Upper Platte River valley south of Saratoga, Wyoming. After Dubois this is one of my favorite places in the country.

This morning we awoke to a little bit of snow. Was sure hoping for a lot more. Lander, 75 miles east of us had a foot. South and central Wyoming has roads closed. We are still hurting for moisture. I am in charge of weather recording for the U S Weather people and we have not had an inch of moisture since Thanksgiving. It was a beautiful morning though and after my session at the Dubois House of Horrors where I put my poor foot through excrusiating circumstances I drove up the mountain above my house but by the time I got to where I could get some nice shots of the departing storm it all socked in on me. fog and flurries. Oh well it was really quite pleasant.
I did get a few hours in on our Deer painting. Working my way down from the top detailing as I go. Even worked the top deer quite a bit. Will be getting more sagebrush in as I go so it won't be as scattered as the top. That should give the painting stability or a foundation at the bottom.

It is high time I get back to my Deer painting. I had to put away my brushes for a few days and do some framing projects for the local Museum and several Dude Ranches and some Gallery Opening projects. Still working on that but Have a little more time to get back to painting.

I also posted the Bighorn Sheep Challenge on my Painting-a-Day blog. Some really great things were done and sent to me. Be sure and check it out.

I even got a little R & R time by spending an afternoon up on East Fork. Was a beautiful day with temperatures into the 60's. That is to change today and single digits expected by Saturday morning. Ahh. Winter to return.

I have for the past several years toyed with the idea of extending my welfare family in the name of wildlife artist research with putting out cracked corn along the edge of my yard. I even had bought a sack but knowing that it can be quite a mess with Bird dropping had refrained for the past year in doing so. Yesterday morning Vicki went ahead and did so and within an hour we were inundated with Canadians and Mallards. I shot this pix from my front room window. At least I can get some pretty good shots of waterfowl.

I worked a little more on this painting this wekend. Beginning the detail on the grasses on the right side and refining still the trees or forest edge if you will on the upper left portion of the painting.

I didn't get any work done on my painting yesterday as I went elk hunting in the morning[with camera]and worked on several other projects. Returned with my wife last night as she wanted to see what she missed in the morning. was not as many elk as there was as in the morning but I could not resist shooting more pictures[see my OUTDOOR ADVENTURES blog]Good research material anyway.

I continued work on this painting last night moving my snow line around on the ridge edge, the shadowed area of snow on the top and playing around with the timber at the top. Think I have something going with it now.

UNSEEN BUT SENSED DANGER
24"x30" Oil Painting
I am off on my painting and have brushed in color mostly to cover up the white and to give me a sense opf where I want to go. Being on a ridge line the right or west side has melted out snow from more direct influence from the sun while the left side will be mostly snow and in shadow. It also serves to give contrast to the deer as they are painted in. Still playing around with the top part of the timber just trying to decide how I want it to read. Also put in another east side of snow towards the top for design and to break up the grasses I will have there.
This is definitely the worst point to show off a painting as folks will think that fool doesn't know what he is doing. Ahh. The scribble phase.
I have gone back to my Painting-a-Day blog and going to try and be a little more consistent on doing something nearly every day. For 2 days now I am good.

For those folks who have given up on my Deer painting begun with idea thru sketches some posts back. I have again begun work on it. I had said it would be a drawn out process as my major wildlife pieces can be. I again changed what I had decided at one point to be a design I would begin painting on. It still botherd me and I let it set and mulled it over for a few weeks in my mind and yesterday and this morning I went back to repositioning and ended up closer to my original idea of a very verticle format. I have now sketched it out on a 24"x36" Canvas and am now ready to apply paint.

Just sat down with a cup of coffee when Russ who is the town paper delivery man came by with the Casper Star-Tribune-the state newspaper. Russ just lost his wife a month ago so it is good to see him back at work delivering. Vicki grabed the camera and caught me in a relaxed moment. Look. No crutch even. Hurts but I am persevering. Is only 35 degrees but got the paper read befor a breeze came up and got cold. So did the coffee.

While much of the state has been receiving snow since yesterday and in fact S E Wyoming is snowed in with road closures we are looking pretty good. We did have a couple of inches yesterday morning but you could not tell it now. My wife and I went out for breakfast this morning and as Vicki likes to walk the mile back home I drove up onto the hill above our house to check out the countryside. Here is the view, with yesterdays snow melted out, of the Ramshorn. I glassed all the country in a 360 degree view and could not find one elk or any critter for that matter. There are several wolf packs working in our area and they have the ungulate populations pretty scattered and laying low.
It is not that warm out but with no wind and the sun shining brightly my wife is out on our deck with her morning coffee. I do believe I will join her. Just too nice to be doing any work.

After working a while on my Big Horn Sheep challenge yesterday I was wasting time going through some old paintings wondering if there was any salvage to the pile and dug this oil painting out. After not looking at it for some time[years]I could definitely see why it had not sold at a gallery I had it in in Saratoga, Wyoming. Embarrassing. But with potential. So through the afternoon I reworked the whole thing keeping pretty much the drawing and mood I enhanced and freshened up the detail. Am now pretty happy with it.
It is from a series of lakes high in the Snowy Range in southern Wyoming and a favorite area of mine. I discovered a series of lakes from climbing up to bench to bench while exploring a mountain stream. Real adventures can be had by the unexpected finds along the way. How is it said? It is not the destination but the journey.
SNOWY RANGE LAKE Oil Painting 10"x15"

I have finished putting the final touches on this Gouache Watercolor Painting.

Detailing out the brush and adding the light to the small spruces on the bottom left hand side. I have downloaded this post larger so by clicking on the image one might get a larger view of the painting.

SOLD

I definitely must be posting too much as I was gone sunday thru tuesday and have had a number of e-mails and phone calls as to my whereabouts. Had my appt. with the foot Dr. Things are continuing to look pretty good. He gave me a velcro ankle brace that sure helps when I wear it and in fact did not use a crutch all day yesterday. Was feeling it though by night. Had my yearly heart Dr. check-up from the stints I had when life flighted 2 years ago whick I blame on the cancer treatments. I had elevated blood pressure which I have never had befor ??So I have to keep a check on that and let them know. Hmm. Then my wife decided it has been a number of years since we had our eyes checked so...Did great with the test with no changes except when I got to the Glaucoma test. Flunked that so now I get to see a specialist for that. Glad I didn't have a check-up with my cancer Doc. That has been great news for awhile now. Incidently the eye Dr told my wife that if everyone had her eyes he would be out of a job.
I did go back to this painting and want to thank everyone for their advice and input as I worked my way through this painting. I was going to include more Willows in the bottom but decided not to so I have only touched up a few spots and did the snow on the bottom log. I am going to call it finished.
SOLD

A little more refinement plus adding the brush and trees on the side. Still pretty much silhouetted in. I have added tracks along the bottom following the stream.

Worked today beginning on the detail and again from left to right and from top to bottom and back to forward. Blackrock Creek begins at Togwotee Pass on the continental divide above Dubois and runs westward into Jackson Hole where it meets up with first the Buffalo River then the Snake River. I was really taken with the light hitting the snow and the snow edges along the open and frozen water. I have left the white of the paper for those lightest edges and a grayer-blue for the tops of the snow with darker cast shadows. In the previous post I had pretty much 1 value in the shadows but all ready I have deepened those back in the trees. I began the trees as dark silhouettes then paint lighter values over defining form. The dark was mixed Indigo and Neutral tint[winsor newton]Some Quindricine rose in places too just to add differences though one would be hard pressed to notice those color changes. I am painting this on #1 Crescent illustration Board.

I must be posting too much on this site as I have been away for several days and have several folks e-mailing wondering where I was.
So back to business. Befor I left last weekend I had started this Gouache watercolor 18"x22" image size, BLACKROCK WINTER. I am in my winter period apparantely. Even though most folks have been in a whiteout most of this winter and ahte to see something like this-we here in NW Wyoming are receiving none of it. Our snow is at 30% of normal. Similar to the winter of 1988 which of course were the prelude to the fires in Yellowtone National Park.
Could we please have some of your snow?

I have gotten my painting to this point today and will now have to wait for it to dry awhile. Still playing around with the light and now trying to decide just how far I should go putting in willows on the floor of this little canyon.

I had to give myself a break from the deer painting. Have gone back to try and finish this winter scene. FORK OF BROOKS LAKE CREEK 12"x24" Oil Painting, that I had started and posted about a week ago. Worked yesterday afternoon on it and am off on it again today.

I posted this Bighorn Sheep image that I photographed the other day on my OUTDOOR ADVENTURE blog and Sheila Tajima asked if she could use it for a painting. We thought it might be fun to issue it as a challenge for a painting to anyone interested in doing so. SO! You are challenged. Please let me know when you have finished yours. I'd like to see what comes of this. Not sure how these things work but if you would e-mail me your finished piece I will post them.
gkeimig@dteworld.com

Transfered onto the canvas and ready to apply paint. I want yet to make one of these or even two Bucks but am thinking yet just which ones or may even add another.

More detailed drawings of the deer I will be using in the painting.

The last several days I have been working very diligently on my Deer Painting that I have previously mentioned and had a rough sketch made out. I had said this would be a lengthy project and it is sure turning out to be but not really unlike any other major painting undertaking. My original thought was to have a fairly vertical painting with the deer ascending a steep hillside sensing danger but not knowing where it was coming from. So far I am calling it UNSEEN BUT SENSED DANGER. After a day and a half of sketching, resketching I decided the whole design was not working as that vertical ascention was too scattered. So yesterday afternoon I scrapped that whole idea and drew the deer closer together but still with the idea that they were searching and slowly beginning to move up into the timber and possible safety beyond. Finally. I think I am onto what I wanted. The canvas size is now 25"wide by 28"high.
After I went to this decision I began sketching the deer out in more detail using my photo research to get the essential anatomy down on each deer. I like to use tracing paper as it begins as a quick sketch then is just easier to overlay with tracing paper and correct what is wrong and keep what is right. This pix shows my detail of the final deer drawings I have transfered to the canvas.

Just to invoke a little humor into my blog. The caption on this photo that I took the other day seems to have the Bighorn Ewe saying, "Hey fellas, Could you open the gate for me" She could actually walk 30 feet to either side where there is no fence.

The camp in Torrey valley was once known as the Audubon Camp of the west as they held educational camps here for years . School teachers, biologists, archeologists and nature enthusiasts now do camps and courses here. Run by the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission.

I have just posted a series of winter sheep photos on my OUTDOOR ADVENTURE BLOG from this great day in the field

For all those folks who gave me so much direction on how I should matt the Platte River Island I'll let you know I did change out the one shown on my post and opted for a kind of ochre color that really did it right. I think it was the perfect choice.
I also have been spending some time the last couple of days working on drawings for my deer painting I have been discussing some posts back. Struggled with the size relationship to the landscape but I think I am finally on to something.

FORK ON BROOKS LAKE CREEK
12"X24" Oil Painting
I started this painting as I have been recently doing-with an underpainting of Acrylic just to get my main masses and a little bit of direction down as to where I might want to go with this painting depicting a mountain Stream NW of Dubois. It is a small side stream that flows into Brooks Lake Creek which is itself a great stream where I used to take my kids and nephews and nieces fishing as it was fairly easy for anyone to catch fish there and the kids loved it. I love to do cross country skiing in the area myself. I have now begun painting with oils at the top and down the left side trying to infuse light back behind the trees that is currently a dark blob. I want to have them in shadow and further down I will have light crossing the snow as if the early morning sun is just breaking through the lasndscape. The stream will course its way towards the painting bottom. Will be playing with that light as I go.
I have another snow scene I want to do in Gouache so I will be posting that in next day or so and will continue to do so as I progress with it.

Last summer we had some folks in the gallery who were interested in buying a photograph of the Badlands out east of Dubois. They had just bought some property to build on for a family get away. They were from Kansas. I suggested that I could do the photogrphy and from their property. I exclaimed it might take a while to get just the right shot. For the next month I made 8 or 9 trips out to the location to get pictures. had just what I wanted on about the 3d trip but I had gotten dust inside my camera and that ruined the pictures with spots. It took nearly a month to get the pictures I wanted and they purchased them from me. About 6 weeks ago they called and wanted the same thing done with a winter view. We have had very little snow the last few months and again I have made several trips out there. Finally yesterday with fresh snow on the ground I made the trip out again and got some descent photos. Only to discover upon returning home that there were those spots again. Ruined. Am I jinxed with this project? It has never happened to me and this is the 2nd time on the same folks project. Snowed again last night and early this moring was breaking up weather wise so my wife and I headed out and with crutches I tromp off into the snow with another camera I have. Got the pictures and I think they are going to work. My wife insisted I put this picture on my blog just to show what I will do for a dollar. I am onto 1 crutch but thought it best to do this with both feet on the ground. There were a number of deer on the hill watching the procedure and all betting on how I would come out. Fooled them. Never fell once.

I didn't get a lot done yesterday but I did mange to finish my EAST FORK COTTONWOOD 11"x14" Oil Painting on canvas. Several posts back I said I was not pleased with a number of things on this painting. What really stuck out was the horizontal bands of hills each equal in size. Boring. So I have reworked it and this reads a lot better now.

I was sitting at my kitchen table with a cup of coffe and dunking the last ginger cookie in the cookie jar and a new Oatmeal-raisin that my wife made just last night. My soft time. Looking past the dinning room widow out the front of the house where a White breasted Nuthatch climbs and descends the cottonwood searhing for grubs or insects of any sort. Both Mountain and Black Capped Chickadees are on the same tree with their song that is always so positive in attitude. It is 8 degrees and for the third morning in a row it is snowing. 3" last night. Very dry as the sun tries to show its muted presence through the overcast with light snow continuing to fall and the light breeze picks up piled snow on branches and blows them off in soft plumes that being so dry turn to snowflakes themselves befor they reach the ground. On beyond the yard the river slows down just enough to form almost a small lake with little current. Ducks, Mallards, Golden Eyes and now and then a Common Merganser congregate. It is fun to watch them but makes one shiver to watch the Mallards tip up with heads underwater while the Goldeneyes plunge under only to resurface moments later. Over the years I have been priveleged to having seen unusual species on the river that were even recorded as unusual in national Birding journals. Old Squaw Ducks more thught of as being in the arctic, harlequins last year. I have several times in the last few weeks even watched a pair of Hooded Mergansers. Very unusual. Now and then a Muskrat will entertain us as he swims from one side of the river to the other side. We used to have beaver there also but neighbors didn't think they were very neighborly and had them trapped out. I even went and wired up all their trees for them so as to save them from the little loggers. There is a lot of willow which only makes them grow back thicker the next year and the beaver seemed to thrive on that arrangement. But to no avail as far as neighbors go. We used to have a lot of Moose that would winter along the river and were always passing through the yard but again they ate the nice deserts they thought folks were planting for them. Harrasement and cutting of willows ended that. I have not seen a Moose around here in 15 years.
The coffee cools off and it is time to end my soft time and climb the stairs to the studio. At the top of my stairs is a door out onto my Deck off the studio and I step out on it and take this picture across my back yard and the neighbors yard with one of his assortment of refurbished wagons that he does such a good job doing. Two Canadian Geese are on the river and are taking issue with one another. In the quiet of this snowy morning even this dissention sounds good. I turn to my desk to write this and start my morning accompanied even as I get to work by the various birds on my bird feeder just out the window from where I am sitting. The two kinds of Chickadees, the Nuthatch, pine Siskins, Cassin Finches, an occassional Goldfinch and Junco. Then there is the visit by our resident Pine Squirell. Life is good in spite of having a bum foot and recovering from this chest cold. It is enough to even want to go to work.