The End is in Sight

I can’t quite believe I’m on the downslope to leaving. Glacier National Park is a huge place to try to get to know in a short time. It’s takes a certain amount of time, energy and networking to get oriented, poke around enough to find the places that grab me and be productive. I can tell that I’ll be working from some of the small studies I did here once I get home. I’m quite taken with the classic views of the Park peaks with burned-over forests in the foreground, to the extent that I’m almost disappointed if there isn’t a burn somewhere near a vista I want to paint. But I have promised not to do this…

(Thanks Jim ; – )

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Elevation-dependent Warming – and Alpine Fires

It may be safe to assume that no one who works in Glacier National Park denies global warming. Proof of change is so overwhelming even the casual visitor can see it. It somehow seems more intense here – though perhaps it is just more visible. But from my interview with Dan Fagre, scientists working in the Park have confirmed a greater rate of change the higher in elevation you go, with profound implications for the species the Park is sworn to protect.

This week I saw my first alpine-zone burn: small and once-ancient, twisted, krummholz fir trees in vertical stripes running up steep meadows on the way to Siyeh Pass. Even the shrubby heathers, kinnikinicks and creeping junipers remain as blackened runners. Sooner or later these will get added to my individual burned tree series.

 

Midpoint

I’ve been here two weeks now. Because I have to drive into town to get sufficient bandwidth to post photos, my blogging is confined to grocery/laundry trips to Columbia Falls.

I have gotten oriented to the Lake McDonald valley area, done seven hikes and produced 13 paintings. Most are too tight — it’s clear to me I’m not yet fully at ease in the environment. (Forgive the low photo quality; I didn’t bring that equipment with me.)

Falls above Avalanche Lake

A theme is emerging – not surprisingly, my new knowledge of the Park’s centennial history, combined with the number of visitors I see on the roads, trails and in the lodge, and walking through burned-over areas suggests juxtaposing iconic tourist views with burned forests in the foreground. This is change writ large. In a sense, I’m returning to my Banff Centre work, back to the entire landscape and not individual burned trees.

Robert Fire Panorama

Up St Mary Valley (Reynolds Creek Fire)

You would think I would know by now, but I’m still surprised that themes emerge as a result of walking in nature. It’s almost like I need so many miles for reflective thinking – even though while walking I’m not aware of “deep thoughts,” just “find the right aerobic pace,” “is there a bear around the next corner,” “how much farther is it,” and “this is just gorgeous..”. If anyone ever asks me about artist blocks, I’ll just tell them to start walking.

 

Climate Change… and Bears

I went to the first day of the Park’s annual Level 1 Bear Training and got a lot of information not only about bears but about how the warming climate is affecting local flora and fauna. Besides well-known glacier-wasting the typical extents and ranges of many plants are changing, possibly affecting many food webs. There is a great deal of science going on here – more than I have been aware of in other parks.  I learned that last year the Park had its first alpine fire; I will definitely be seeking out charred krumholz to paint.

This may just be my ignorance, but a number of programs are housed at Park Headquarters and there seems to be a lot of interagency and inter-institution collaboration. They are justly proud of bringing the bears back from the edge of endangerment.

I’m afraid bear training didn’t make me feel any less apprehensive—just put more imaginary movies in my mind. The missing data for me are: number of annual visitor-bear encounters versus the number of annual non-bad outcomes per encounter. One has to assume the numbers are somewhere between the ~1 injury or fatality per year since the park began, and the 2 million visitors per year – but where?

It is a new kind of constraint, feeling that it’s unwise to hike alone and sit quietly painting plein air. So mostly I do a quick drawing on my watercolor paper while singing all the verses I can remember to “Roll On, Columbia” and paint it when I get back to the cabin.  So far, four hikes, five paintings ; – )

 

Addendum:

A friend sent a 2012 article that cites Stephen Herero saying 98% of bear encounters where pepper spray was used have positive outcomes for both human and bear… a reassuring statistic though I’d still like to get a sense of the frequency of such encounters.

Internet withdrawal

It takes me about an hour to drive out to Montana Coffee Traders to get enough bandwidth to post. I can make a cell call about 30 minutes from the cabin. I can take 15 minutes to walk up to the Lake MacDonald Lodge to sort basic email over Wi-Fi… But I am finding it harder and harder to be so incommunicado. I revel in the peace but also feel lost and disoriented. It’s not just being in a new place; I’m used to encountering anything new with an overlay of virtual information. It’s one thing to spend a day out in the mountains outside the hive mind; it’s another to live and work in what becomes de-facto isolation. I’m not lonely hiking and painting alone. Loneliness is something different from the absence of communication. I’m sure I’m not the first to comment, but in the 15 years of near-constant connection, I begin to wonder how much I exist absent my cyberspace identity.

Off on Another Adventure

This time I am headed to Glacier National Park to be their June Artist-in-Residence. Following my tradition, here is my car, packed and ready to go:

While I am getting better at getting these trips organized, there is always a last few days of remembering something in the middle of the night—but I still arrive realizing which things I forgot, even when they were on my lists! At least so far: binoculars, my backcountry lunch bag with my favorite Swiss army knife and stash of ibuprofen, self-healing cutting board, and onions.

Besides urban legends and political boats, the Internet lied about the travel time between Seattle and Glacier – it took not 8.5 hours but 10.5, even without stops. Here is what I arrived to:

My hopes for this residency?

• Close encounters with a new wonderful place and people (and not grizzly bears ; – )
• Renewed commitment to the natural world
• Some landscape paintings that bring the genius loci alive (otherwise photos would suffice)
• Encounters with burned-over forests that bring me not only new source materials but new ways of thinking about or presenting their meaning

The first thing I worked on, besides getting settled, were half-finished paintings I brought from home. The night before I left was my painting group night; despite lack of sleep and pre-trip jitters, I was happy with my starts. Here they are on my current local-rock mantelpiece—a reminder of home: