Impression Evergreen

"Ghost Horse" Colored Pencil Floating out of an eerie windbreak, a white apparition confronts the viewer face-to-face. It’s a piercing dawn in the Sandhills as the ghost horse haunts a prairie hacienda. The pale wraith is peaceful and harmless as it drifts through a moat of tall grass. Trying to bridle him in, a rough-hewn stockade is suggested by an irregular grid of interlocking, geometric shapes. Defined by a steel-blue shadow, the phantom’s head is the portrait of simplicity. His shaggy, winter robe is conveyed by the purest of white with touches of cool gray smudged into the shape. With the rapid rise of technology, automation and manufacturing, we creep ever closer to becoming the ultimate, urban civilization. It’s heartening to come home to western Nebraska where vast tracts of ranch land scenery can still be found, summoning the resilient spirit of the Old West.

Forest Bison An enduring symbol of the Great Plains, the American Bison was driven to the brink of extinction during Westward Expansion. After a modest recovery, they can now be found in a woodland that adorns Colorado’s Front Range foothills. The mountain herd roams through a labyrinth of sharp slopes, draws, gulches and ravines that comprise Genesee Park. There is lots of activity at the forest’s edge where this year’s spirited younglings kick, buck, run and play from dawn until dusk. Born in May, the precocious devils are born into the world big and agile. The whole congregation is pretty protective and the cows collectively take care of the calves for about a year. They are reddish-orange at birth but their coloring gradually deepens in concert with the development of their fierce independence. On this warm summer evening, the different individuals engage in various behaviors such as resting, grazing and rock climbing. The easy-going adults move efficiently through the timb...

The Wilson's Snipe The reclusive Wilson’s snipe lives in North America but you'd be lucky to ever lay eyes on one. Because of his secretive nature, he’s most active around dusk and dawn while preferring to sleep much of the daytime. When he's awake this plump, little shorebird uses his long, flexible bill to probe in the mud for larvae and earthworms. His unique mandible can move independently upwards allowing him to swallow small prey without having to pull his bill out of the dirt. The Wilson’s snipe is mottled brown overall with a white belly and streaked breast. Dark stripes decorate his head and back. He makes his nest in the wetlands where his drab plumage blends perfectly into the dried, cattail willows. His bill is outrageously long and his eyes are set so far back on his head that he can see not only in front and to the sides but also completely behind. He has short legs and massive flight muscles so when he’s flushed from his safe haven he can explode i...