You hike for the views, the solitude, the big nature, right? Me too. That’s why I always pack a pencil. The weight-to-usefulness ratio is off the charts, because when I draw a mountainscape, that’s when I really come to know it, honor it, and remember it. That last bit is key, especially in the off-season. Drawings help you tap into past stokes, and inspire you to plan new ones. Pencils up everybody!
What’s that you say? You can’t draw?
I’m no Frederick Remington, either. But I draw anyway—because it forces me to slow down and actually see the landscape, because it stokes memories of trail life, and because it motivates me to seek new pencil-perfect landscapes.
My first sketchy hike was to the Benedict Huts, just south of Aspen. After I completed the six-mile snowshoe in, split kindling, and coaxed a roaring fire in the wood stove, I tore off a sheet of the blank newsprint provided as a firestarter, picked up my No. 2 pencil, and began staring at the glorious Sawatch Range, visible through the picture window.
What next? It takes just three steps to draw a landscape.
Your first drawing will suck. Who cares? You’re doing this to pay homage to a landscape, not to land on the auction block at Christie’s. Take pencil in hand and start. You learned to walk before you learned to backpack, and this will be a journey, too.
Nishant Jain, the sketch-meister behind the SneakyArt Post on Substack, has guided hundreds of artists through their first scribbles. “The easiest way to start a drawing is to zoom in on what catches your eye,” he says. “Tap into your curiosities and interests. The better you get at this, the less time you waste in hesitations and second thoughts.”
Draw one line, then another one. See? You’re already an artist!
Once they get over themselves, artists face another decision: How much detail to include?
Select an object like this pinecone, which I pulled out of the kindling box at the hut. A sweeping landscape works, too. Don’t overcomplicate your rendering. Find the details that make the scene–the triangle pattern to the pinecone, the sinuous line of the far off ridge–and get those right. Render one riveting detail accurately and your drawing is a success.
Drawing isn’t about you. It’s about where you are, and what pleases your eye. If you concentrate on the contours of that ridgeline, or the curve of the marmot’s claws while it eats that Columbine blossom, you’ll see them in new ways, and that will guide your hand. Sure it takes practice—like anything worthwhile.
“Drawing is a way to give time and attention to what you see,” Jain points out. “Unlike a photo, it is not a record of a single moment, but a distillation of the entire time spent at that spot, paying attention to a landscape constantly changing in subtle or dramatic ways.”
That said, photos are the next best thing to being there. So when you’re stuck inside with the latest Covid variant, open iPhoto, for art reference, and start a sketch. You’ll relive the memory, and increase your skills for the next time nature poses naked and alive before you.
I completed the drawing below during snowshoe recovery at Uncle Bud’s Hut, high above Leadville, Colorado. It was March 2020, just before the pandemic shutdown, and it helped me through the long months when the 10th Mountain Huts were closed.
My drawing allowed me to return with a glance. Start drawing now, and you’ll draw from your memory banks for years to come.
“The great benefit of drawing is in the time spent doing it,” says Jain. “In our culture of hyper-optimization and productivity games, drawing bucks the trend. You do because it is fun, not because of the results. Its value is in the process.”
There you have it: A professional artist’s permission for you to screw up, artistically. Make one lousy drawing, and then enhance a few details next time. Maybe add watercolors, if that suits you. Soon you’ll have a scenic scrapbook that’s far more precious than mere pixels, because it comes authentically from your hand. From you.
That’s where the beauty lies.
From 2023
