their Buffalo Art Press studio and the first of a series of weekly art classes. The classes are meant to do more than teach drawing, painting and printmaking. “We’re creating a community of people learning about art together,” Kuennen said. The couple, who met in grad school at the University of California at Long Beach, married in 2006. Kuennen, who was raised in Bozeman, settled in Billings after watching over a friend’s ranch at Molt. They fell into their studio when they met the owners of Meadowlark Gallery at an ArtWalk. “Robin does drawings of birds and swans in charcoal that are so exquisite, so beautifully done and finished,” said Sally McIntosh, who arranged the couple’s RMC show. Earles has begun creating frame-able art prints tucked in notecards as an affordable way for people to collect art. Kuennen, who always assumed he’d be a Western artist, is inspired by the optimism and sparkle of illustrators from the 1950s and ‘60s. A freelance illustrator for more than 30 years, he taught classes at the Art Center School of Design in Pasadena, Calif., landscape painting in Provence, France and a monoprint class for the Yellowstone Art Museum in 2011. “There’s a love of life in his work, always a song behind the work, a narrative to it,” Earles said. Like true optimists, they talk about how the lawn and snow shoveling business has forced them outdoors at times of incredible beauty. Working in an early-morning snowstorm, Kuennen remembers how the amber gold sky and intense blue pine trees were like an impressionist painting. Robin Earles is represented by Toucan Gallery, while Steve Kuennen is represented by Meadowlark Gallery. Their work, along with information on their studio art classes, can be found at www.buffaloartpress.com.
Top left: I Caught A Good One It Looked Like It Could Run, Kuennen. Right: Top Of The World –Beartooths, Kuennen, Linoleum Block. Middle left: Interlude, Earles, Charcoal on Paper Middle right: One Swallow, Earles, Intaglio – Image for Frameable Card. Left: Bull Buffalo, Kuennen, Linoleum Block
MAGIC CITY MAGAZINE I FEBRUARY 2014 I 21