Lanny Grant: Back to the Winds

Trailside Galleries presents Lanny Grant’s newest paintings of the Wind River Range in Wyoming.

In 2012, Lanny Grant was invited by wildlife artist Tucker Smith on a painting trip to the Wind River Range in western Wyoming. The weeklong adventure to the 2,800-square-mile area left a lasting impression on Grant, who has gone a pack trip to the mountains every year since. Largely untouched, the terrain is mostly accessible by horse or foot with its trails leading to lakes and small inlets that often provide inspiration to the artist. “You could spend several lifetimes there and never see it all,” says Grant.

This summer, Trailside Galleries in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, will host Back to the Winds featuring Grant’s latest works from the mountain range. “Four years ago [was my Trailside exhibition] Into the Winds. That was the first one based on these trips,” says Grant, “so this is sort of the sequel.”

Along with the artists who head to Wind River Range today, the region has seen past Western artists travel to the area including wildlife master Carl Rungius. “Out of interest and curiosity, we retrace the routes that Carl Rungius did over 100 years ago,” Grant explains. “It’s where he first painted in the U.S. after coming from Germany. For 15 or 20 years he would go back to these same areas, and that’s where he’d get a lot of the landscape research and field studies for his wildlife work. You can match up some of the field studies with the locations when you’re in there. There are still rocks and things he painted in the foreground that haven’t changed in 100 years.”

That idea of the unchanged terrain is one that has resonated with Grant, who says aside from unfortunate wildfires and beetle infestations, it remains mostly as it was. “That’s sort of the timeless quality that you can still go in there and see these things,” Grant says. “It’s just a big thrill no matter how many times you do it, and you’ll always discover things you didn’t see.”

Nature is the main sources of inspiration for Grant’s artwork, and because of that not only will there be full-size works in the exhibition at Trailside, but several field studies are included as well. Some of them even match the larger pieces to show the process of his work. “[My studies] are really the research and the color reference that I need for painting firsthand and matching color to color what your eye sees,” says Grant.

He adds that when he was viewing an exhibition of Bob Kuhn’s work, he saw a drawing that the artist had done and in the corner of it was a note Kuhn wrote that said, “Never alter a field study.” This was a sentiment Grant took to heart. “When I come home from these pack trips, I don’t work on the field study…Mostly it’s because of what Bob was referencing,” Grant explains. “You can’t duplicate what you create out in the field back in the studio.”

Upcoming Show
Up to 24 works
July 27-Aug. 8, 2020
Trailside Galleries
130 E. Broadway Avenue
Jackson Hole, WY 83001
(307) 733-3186
www.trailsidegalleries.com