By Deborah Olsen

In 2011, artist and environmentalist Joan Hoffmann returned to the Yampa Valley to host a 40-year retrospective of her work, an exhibit that showcased her passion for the Steamboat Springs’ landscape.  The solo show was especially meaningful for her, as the community helped launch her career in the early ‘70s. “There was just this energy,” she recalled. “Steamboat was so receptive.” 

Hoffmann, who moved from California to Vermont three years ago, has given talks about the symbiotic relationship between American painters who created iconic images of the West and the preservation efforts that were inspired by those images.

She returns to Steamboat this September for a month-long show at the Depot, “Wild Landscapes – Wild Cranes.” One of the pieces in the exhibit serves as the signature piece for the 2014 Yampa Valley Crane Festival, Sept. 12-14.

Hoffmann has also been asked to be a presenter at the National Wilderness Conference in Albuquerque, N.M., in October.  "Landscapes are about connections,” Hoffmann says. “’Art of Wilderness,’ my program, shows these connections and visualizes and verbalizes that which makes us human."