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Insider’s Guide to Olympic National Park: Art of the Park

PETER MALARKEY
Maple Flats 2011
To mark the removal of the Elwha River’s two dams, Malarkey is painting a before-and-after series of oils on linen. This location below Glines Canyon will change dramatically when the river runs free again, at which point Malarkey plans to recapture the scene. It’s part of the Back Country, on view through October 9 at the Port Angeles Fine Arts Center.

 

STEVE DAVIS
Summer on the Skokomish 2011 (detail)
Davis, who teaches photography at Evergreen State College, snapped the park during the Mount Hopper fire of August 2010, a blaze that
was allowed to burn as a natural part of forest rejuvenation. The work appears in Reclaimed: Nature and Place Through Contemporary Eyes, through September 11 at Seattle Art Museum.

 

Image: SFMOMA

EIRIK JOHNSON
Elwha River Dam, Washington 2008
Permanent collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
The Seattle-based Johnson created his Sawdust Mountain series by photographing the old lumber and fishing towns of Washington, Oregon, and California, capturing weathered structures, stoic faces, and the toll the industries take on the landscape.

 

QUINAULT INDIAN NATION
Woman’s breastplate circa 1880
Permanent collection of the National Museum of the American Indian, Washington, DC
This ceremonial piece is made of dentalium shells, which come from mollusks and were used by coastal tribes for decoration as well as trade with inland peoples.

 

N.P. BANK NOTE COMPANY
Olympic Nat’l Park Loop 1941
University of Washington Libraries Special Collections
A local tour company’s brochure promised a $20, two-day tour that included “a glimpse of the rugged Olympics” and “the sandy shores of the Pacific.”

Published in the Insider's Guide to Olympic National Park issue of Seattle Met.











Allison Williams
Allison Williams
Since joining Seattle Met in 2011, Allison Williams has overseen the magazine’s travel and outdoor coverage, including deep dives into Olympic National Park, the Columbia River, and a Burger King drive-thru in Canada. She edits the travel-focused blog Tripster and contributes service, news, interview, and narrative pieces to the magazine, including long-form features about mountain mysteries and puppies in prison. She’s earned awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and been nominated for a City and Regional Magazine award.  Allison was raised here in Olympia and studied writing at Duke University, Oxford University, Columbia Journalism School, and University of Alaska. She began her career in New York City in the newsrooms of Metro newspaper and Time Out New York, then hightailed it back to her native habitat so she could write guidebooks and climb mountains.