It's a learning process. First, you set the background. Then, you work the lights to bring out the shadows in the musculature and to highlight the dramatic points in the painting. Next, you position the camera and climb the ladder or duck low to see what the camera sees.
Sergeants Mike Poole and George Weickum of the Wyoming National Guard seen here fraternizing with three of the many grizzlies that are "hibernating" at the Cody Armory before moving on to their summer habitat. Many thanks to these men and their colleagues who provided studio space for several artists and who've helped load and unload grizzlies as they've come and gone. The Cody Armory, because of their hospitality, has become the real center of "A Gathering of Grizzlies."
Thanks to Mike and Margie Johnson of Cody's Trolley Tours for their generosity in donating a Cody Trolley and driver for three tours of the Grizzly Artists' studios in and around Cody. Convivial and enthusiastic groups gathered for each of the tours, making appreciative audiences for the grizzlies and their artistic creators. Each tour ended at the Rudolph studio, where Jeff used the original sculpture, the fiberglass molds, and a fiberglass model to show how the grizzly came to be and how it morphed into twenty-five clones.
Ty Barhaug's grizzly, "This is Grizzly Country," ready for one pose, facing the camera. Photographer, Elijah Cobb, is off-stage.
A member of the Park County teen library council and her mother admiring Pat Schermerhorn's bear, Onslow, during the Trolley Tour of artist's studios.
The flora and fauna that adorn Onslow's hide draw their inspiration from the high plains, mountains, and valleys of the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem, the home to the majority of the world's grizzly bears. Cunningly woven together, these many creatures—forty-four of them—speak to our love of nature and the value of their habitat. For Onslow's younger visitors, it's a challenge finding and naming the many species.
