By Lisa Laughlin
Cover photo courtesy of Clarin J
Her fireweed painting spoke to me first. The color and detail made me recall some of my favorite backcountry memories of walking trails framed by the bright pink wildflower. I bought a print for my home from the Wildland Co-op, excited to look more into the artist.
When I did, I realized Vanessa Swenson was already everywhere around town. Unfamiliar with her signature, I had already admired her river-inspired mural in the Kendall Yards corridor adjacent to Umi’s. I had noted the wonderful, leafy pen-and-ink vegetables on the cardboard exterior of my LINC box shipment. I had even bought a pint glass with one of her digital mountain scenes at The Scale House Market in the fall. That’s my favorite kind of experience: “discovering” an artist and then following their footprint all through the community you already know and love.
Swenson, who began as a digital designer, made the switch to fine art several years ago and was recognized with a solo art exhibition at Terrain in March 2024. Her exhibit, titled “State of Awe,” was a collection that included the backcountry sketches, photos and notes that inspire her watercolor and acrylic originals. From close-up beargrass and balsamroot florals to landscapes from the Enchantments and North Cascades, big and small inspirations from nature sing with color and movement in Swenson’s work.
It was natural for Swenson to recognize the cyclical relationship behind her art: her paintings were inspired by the wild places and public lands she explored, and she wanted her art to help sustain those places in return. Each year, 5% of Swenson’s art sales is donated to Northwest-based environmental efforts and organizations. Past beneficiaries have included Washington Native Plant Society, The Lands Council and the Inland Northwest Land Conservancy. In 2026, 5% of her art sales will be donated to the Washington Trails Association.
“That feeling of awe is my main motive to go explore those new places and make art about it,” Swenson says. “It feels like my tangible way to reflect on it and connect with it and others. You tap into how engrained all these natural spaces are in all of us. I want to share my experience of this place, and hopefully that means this place and the whole natural world could be a little bit better for it if I share my story about it.”
In the last year, Swenson had an addition that redefined her sense of awe: a son. She created two new paintings in 2025, the year she became a mother, and says the role has reframed the way she sees her work. One painting, titled “Nurse Log,” was based on an inspired sketch from the Hoh Rainforest that she revisited in her sketchbook after becoming a mom.
“Just the whole nurse log concept, a fallen tree that helps support everything else in the forest, and [then] there’s this little baby and you’re like, oh, yeah, I’m a literal nurse log right now,” she says with a laugh.
Motherhood demands a new flow for an artist. Swenson says she created both 2025 originals in 20-minute spurts while her baby was napping next to her easel. “Watercolor is so forgiving, especially in this era of motherhood and distractions,” she notes. “The paint just dries and you can come back to it and revisit it on your palette, whereas when I’m using oil or acrylic, once you put it on the palette, you’ve got to use it.”
Her time on the trails looks a little different after baby too. She chooses more family-accessible routes rather than logging miles into the high country and the pace is slower. While Swenson says she was already the one who would lag behind on a backpacking trip to stop and look at moss or take a photo, having a kid gives her more time to appreciate the little things, whether she wants to or not. Sometimes, that appreciation comes as close as her backyard.
“Something that I’ve always tried to carry with me, now especially with a kid, is that you can just go to your backyard and find the same kind of awe you can find hiking miles into the wilderness,” Swenson says. “All summer, my son was mesmerized by the bark on this maple tree in my backyard. Just watching a baby look at bark, you’re like, yeah, it is the most incredible thing in the world. I don’t think they could ever replicate any texture as cool as lichen and bark. It helps you really see that magic in a new light.”
This spring, you can find Swenson on a stroller walk on the Waikiki Springs trails or sketching in the flower garden at the Wildland Co-op, an endeavor she and her husband, Michael Townshend, helped evolve into a collective of art and local goods, community supported agriculture (including flowers and veggies), small-batch craft beer, Townshend Cellar wines and a Christmas tree farm. Wildland Co-op has also set land aside for conservation and rewilding projects in the Green Bluff area north of Spokane (Wildland.coop).
Swenson says she’s excited for springtime and arrowleaf balsamroot season, looking forward to exploring her art in new ways as a mom in the coming year. Follow her journey and support Washington Trails Association by purchasing her art at the Wildland Co-op, Scale House Market, From Here in downtown Spokane or at Vanessaswenson.com.
Lisa Laughlin is the managing editor of Out There Outdoors. She is a trail runner and mother and can’t wait for the first balsamroot to unfurl along the trail.
