Archive

Visitors can experience Cory James McLaughlin’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

Timber Greenheads

When the Water was Low

Warming Light

May 21, 2026 In

Yelena Lamm

Painter | Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Yelena Lamm Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

Yelena Lamm was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia, where she received her formal art training from the N. K. Roerich Fine Arts School. Since 1995, she lives in Pittsburgh, PA. Yelena is painting primarily in oil. She is known for her portraits of pets and animals, in which she reflects on her subjects’ characters and personalities, as well as for her lively and colorful floral compositions. Yelena is a Signature member of Oil Painters of America (OPA), Society of Animal Artists (SAA), American Impressionist Society (AIS), and National Oil and Acrylic Painters’ Society (NOAPS). Yelena’s works were selected for and won awards in juried regional and national shows. Her list of awards includes ARC Staff Awards in both 17th and 18th ARC Salon Competitions, First Place in the Animals as the Subject category of Portrait Society of America Members Only Competition in 2024 and 2025, Most Original Award of Excellence in OPA 2023 Eastern Regional Exhibition, Outstanding Achievement Animals in AWA 2023 Annual Online Juried Show, and SAA 63rd Art & the Animal Exhibition Purchase Award. Britain’s most popular magazine for practicing artists, Artists & Illustrators, featured Yelena’s animal portraits in a 6-page article and on the cover of their June 2023 issue. The October 2025 issue of the Artists & Illustrators features Yelena’s step-by-step painting process in a 5-page feature article.

Yelena’s works are represented by Reinert Fine Art in Charleston, SC, Main Exhibit Gallery in Ligonier, PA, The Zebra Gallery in Easton, MD, The Lucy Clark Gallery & Studio in Brevard, NC, and Picket Fence Art Studio in Woodinville, WA.

Artist Links

Visitors can experience Yelena Lamm’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

The Call

Dandelion Council

Head-On

May 21, 2026 In

David Kiehm

Painter | Oneonta, New York

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David Kiehm Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

Dave has been honored with awards nationally and internationally including the prestigious award: “BBC Wildlife Artist of the Year”. The Judges said about Dave’s painting, ‘Foundation Wall’: “This painting stood out in a competitive category because of its lovely composition, exquisite detail and excellent depiction of light.”

Dave has traveled extensively throughout North America and Europe to observe wildlife and wild places for subjects for his paintings. These paintings have been shown at Marwell International Wildlife Society, UK, Roger Tory Peterson Institute Museum, The Houston Museum of Natural History, The Hiram Blauvelt Art Museum, and The Nature in Art Gallery and Museum, UK, to name a few.

Dave lives and works in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains of New York with his family, including his golden retriever, Maggie.

Artist Links

Visitors can experience David Kiehm’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

Resting Ravens

One Too Many

Marsh Overlook

May 21, 2026 In

Laura Hopkins

Painter | Middlesburg, Virginia

Laura Hopkins Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

Laura Hopkins paints expressive, atmospheric landscapes in oil. The fleeting light of twilight, dawn, and evening, particularly in autumn and winter, serve as favorite motifs.

Born and raised in Franklin, a small dairy farming town in rural southeastern Connecticut, Hopkins spent much of her childhood exploring the stonewall bordered fields, woods, and wetlands surrounding her family home. She now lives in the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains outside Middleburg, Virginia, amid pastures and fields criss-crossed with stone walls and three-board fences.

Although Hopkins creates much of her work in the studio, her painting process remains rooted in time spent outdoors. Field studies, drawings, and photos serve as a creative wellspring for intuitive, gestural paintings that can vary from closely representative of a specific place to boldly imagined from an abstract start.

Her work is strongly influenced by the historic American Tonalists, a group whose moody and atmospheric landscapes paintings of rural and coastal New England were popular in the decades between the Civil War and WWI.

Hopkins is a member of the Oil Painters of America, the American Impressionist Society, American Women Artists, the Loudoun Sketch Club, and the Lyme (CT) Art Association. Her award-winning work has been featured in Elan Magazine and Middleburg Life.

Artist Links

Website
Instagram

Visitors can experience Laura Hopkins’ work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

Winter Nocturne, oil on panel, 16x20

Autumntide oil on stretched canvas, 18x24,

Night’s Embrace, oil on panel, 9x12

May 21, 2026 In

Julia Rogers

Painter | Easton, Maryland

Julia Rogers Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

Being an artist and painting nature was inevitable. Growing up on the

Chesapeake Bay on the eastern shore of Maryland has had a strong influence

on me since childhood. I have an endless desire to paint and over the years I have worked in several mediums and gradually developed a distinctive style that is seen today in my oil paintings. I also paint a wide variety of subjects. It is important to expand and try new things and push into different areas. Painting en plain air, figurative work and portraiture are all part of my discipline. Extensive travel is also documented in my portfolio. Many periods of growth in my paintings can be attributed to reference trips I have taken. Wildlife has been very inspirational to my work and is my personal favorite. Seeing animals in their own environment and witnessing their natural behavior in person changed the way I paint.

Julia lives with her husband, artist Matthew Hillier, their son Patrick and their two dogs.

Exhibitions

Cincinnati Museum Center, “In the Audubon Tradition Exhibit” 2019

The Briscoe Museum, “Night of Artists” San Antonio Tx, 10 years participating up to 2020

2017 Featured Artist, Waterfowl Festival 2017

Society of Animal Artists Juried Show for Members

Leigh Yawkey Woodson, “Birds in Art”, …, 2016, 2017, 2018

Wildlife and Western Art Show, Raymond James Financial, St. Petersburg, FL

Safari Club International

Hiram Blauvelt Museum, three man show, “Kalihari to Kilimanjaro”

Waterfowl Festival, Easton, MD

Gilcrease Museum

Raymond James Women in the Arts- Artist of the year and speaker

Articles

Art of the West

Sporting Classic

Wildlife Art News

Africa Geographic

Collections

The James Museum of Western and Wildlife Art

Leigh Yawkey Woodson Museum

Raymond James Financial collection,

Martin Revson, Revlon Collection

Kessler Collection

Rosenberg-Martin-Greenberg

Baltimore Life Insurance Headquarters

Valerie and Jack Guenther, Briscoe Museum

Society of Animal Artists Board Member

Artist Links

Visitors can experience Julia Roger’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

Miles of Sunsets

Up Stream

Whistling Swan

May 21, 2026 In

Matthew Hillier

Painter | Easton, Maryland

Matthew Hillier Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

Matthew Hillier was born in the Buckinghamshire village of Farnham Common, which is a stone’s throw from Windsor Castle. His family moved down to West Sussex and he was lucky enough to be brought up in a beach house in a small seaside community called Elmer Sands.

At Sixteen Matthew left school to attend Dyfed College Of Art in Carmarthen S.Wales. The College was the first in the country to offer a “Wildlife Illustration Course and Matthew was the youngest student in the College. He spent three Idyllic years traveling around the Welsh countryside learning to paint Birds and Animals. He Graduated with distinction.

Before his Eighteenth Birthday he had three of his paintings accepted by the Royal Academy for Its Summer Exhibition. This was a first, and led to a barrage of publicity, and some very useful early name recognition.

He went on to earn his living as a Wildlife Artist, Illustrator. Over the next few years he Illustrated many books, magazines, Calendars,Greetings cards etc, whilst also finding time to have exhibitions of his paintings. He was elected a member of the Society Of Wildlife Artists, as well as being a regular exhibitor in many of the other societies Including The Paris Salon, the Pastel Society and the Society Of Marine Artists. Over the years he has won many awards all over the World. His Illustration Career culminated in a Commission to Illustrate a large limited edition book called “The Rhinoceros, A Monograph. This commission changed everything. He spent several years traveling around the World studying four of the five species of Rhinos in their habitat. He was Invited to spend three months in Zimbabwe looking at Black and White Rhinos and spent time in the jungle in Sumatra with ”Torgamba”, a beautiful sumatran rhino

He began to work with publishers in the States doing limited edition prints. Whilst working with Mill Pond press he was Invited by the company to spend two years in Florida . During this time he was sent to galleries around the country promoting his prints. Whilst on a Plein Air painting course in Montana he began dating the Artist Julia Rogers. They went on to marry. They have a teenage son Patrick, and two older step Children, Matthew and Stephanie.

In 2000 Matthew moved permanently to the States. He now lives on the Eastern Shore of Maryland in the picturesque waterside village of Tunis Mills near the town of Easton.

He is represented by several Galleries in MD as well as Galleries in Florida and Jackson Hole WY. He has paintings in the James Museum in St Petersburg FL and the Hirem Blauvelt Museum in NJ. He is a member of the Society of Animal Artists, The American society of Marine Artists and a regular exhibitor at Birds In Art, and the Briscoe Museum”Night Of Artists in San Antonio TX. He has been featured Artist at the Waterfowl Festival in Easton. He teaches workshops around the country, as well as a weekly oil painting class at the Academy Art museum in Easton MD this Fall.

Artist Links

Visitors can experience Matthew Hillier’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

Leopard

On the Dock

Bottoms Up

May 21, 2026 In

Carol Heiman-Greene

Painter | Orange, California

Carol Heiman-Greene Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

It was in college that Carol realized her love of drawing and painting could be her life’s work. She graduated from California State University, Long Beach with a BFA in illustration. Even as an illustrator her work was animal oriented, so when she decided to follow her true passion and become a fine artist specializing in wildlife, she felt confident there would be exciting adventures ahead. Carol is inspired by all aspects of nature and all of her paintings are based on personal reference. From the small and flashy hummingbirds in her back yard, to the great bison and grizzlies in Yellowstone. She explains, “I must experience my subjects first hand to see their amazing character and spirit, to make that connection to them. Wildlife never ceases to amaze me, and translating my wonder into my work is my driving force.” Working in oils, Carol uses many techniques of the Old Masters, layering in an underpainting and glazing in colors to create depth and dimension, then finishing with thicker layers of colors to bring her paintings to life. Life and Light are central to Carol’s work Her joy comes from capturing even the smallest of moments to the most dramatic that nature has to offer. Carol has been selected to be a member of: Women Artists Of The West Artists for Conservation Miniature Artists Of America

Artist Links

Visitors can experience Carol Heiman-Greene’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

When Life Gives You Lemons

Black And Blue

Miss Cypress

May 21, 2026 In

John Eiseman

John Esieman

Painter | Hebron, Maryland

John Eiseman Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

My work encompasses two primary genres – “Plein Air” landscapes and figures; using two primary mediums – oils and watercolors. The paintings are surely representational and indeed narrative at times, but the imagery is not about the pictorial. I use the subject matter (whether it be a farmhouse, tree, cloud, wave or figure) as elements of design in order to capture specific natural phenomena, moment in space and time and mood of “event.” Painting is not just the celebration of vision but, rather a quest for experience. In this sense, my painting is not a recording of facts seen. It is the process of interpreting a fleeting muse. This process is, as a result, in a constant state of emergency. Like dance, painting must change anew to the beat of the muse. After conceiving a painting in the field, establishing value relationships, coordinating color fields and bringing forth some detail resolution, I bring the painting home to its studio and let it “cook” for a while. Removed from the subjective space, the painting requires a life of its own. I hold suspicious a painting that is resolved easily. “Pushing and Pulling” an image, adding and subtracting values, adjusting color is what brings a painting together. I generally try to stretch my own canvases. I use four coats of gesso, each layer less thinned that the previous one and I sand between coats. More often than not, I will tone the canvas with Acrylic. This allows me to “Push and Pull” from the middle of the tonal value scale. It also presents a homogeneous color field, enriching the overall body of color. My palette is quite limited consisting of; Yellow Ochre, Cadmium Yellow, Alizarin Crimson, Cadmium Red, Cobalt Blue, Ultramarine Blue, Cerulean Blue, Viridian, Burnt Umber and Titanium White. I may occasionally add another color or two depending on mood and subject. I rarely draw on the canvas, preferring to immediately paint—allowing the “drawing” to sculpt itself. I rely heavily on good “drawing” skills and expressive painterly techniques. I may be seen on many highways and byways painting directly from nature.

My paintings have won numerous awards and have been accepted in many juried exhibitions both regionally and nationally.

Artist Links

Visitors can experience John Esieman’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

Meet at the Pass

River Rhythms

Three Terrapins

May 21, 2026 In

Lori Dunn

Painter | Norwood, Ontario

Lori Dunn Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

Canadian wildlife artist Lori Dunn has had a long history of combining science and art. With a natural artistic ability from a very early age, teachers tried to steer her towards a career in art, but her real desire was to study nature and wildlife. Enrolling in the zoology program at the University of Guelph in Ontario, was a first step towards gleaning the knowledge she craved. Lori was interested in all forms of nature, but she was always drawn towards those creatures that other people paid little attention to, or were even frightened of.

After graduating with her zoology degree, Lori Dunn embarked on a 15 year career as a zookeeper in Canada, spending much of her time working with small animals including amphibians and reptiles, doing public presentations and volunteering her free time toward conservation efforts in Ontario including surveys, habitat restoration, and outreach.

Eventually, Lori left zoo keeping to embark on a new journey as an artist. She feels her need to put her animal education and experience first was key to her eventual success as a wildlife artist, and she still considers herself a naturalist first, with artwork a vehicle to express her passion to the viewer.

Scratchboard allows this artist the control over detail that she strives for. These black and white clayboard engravings produce works of art with incredible realism and quality of light and are considered by many artists to be one of the most difficult mediums to master.

Lori Dunn’s scratchboard artworks have garnered National and International recognition winning awards in several world class exhibitions. In addition, her work has been featured in several blogs, magazines and books. She is a signature member of the Society of Animal Artists, and a master member of the International Society of Scratchboard Artists. She currently teaches scratchboard art via private lessons and workshops.

Lori works from her pioneer log home in Norwood, Ontario, Canada, and when she isn’t creating artwork she is invariably out kayaking, hiking and enjoying nature in all of its forms.

Artist Links

Visitors can experience Lori Dunn’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.

Featured Works

Primed

Evening Walkabout

Buzz Kill

May 21, 2026 In

Kim Diment

Painter | Grayling, Michigan

Kim Diment Among Distinguished Artists at 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival

A Northern Michigan native, Kim Diment’s art brings personality and life to the animals she portrays. Her art and love for animals started at young age. Her first preteen sketches came from wanderings along the backwaters of the AuSable River. She drove her parents nuts by bringing home toads, frogs, turtles, and orphaned animals. After High School, Kim obtained a double major from Michigan State University in Fine Arts and Zoology. She later went on to teach High School art for thirteen years while simultaneously pursuing an art career. Kim has been fortunate to be able to travel extensively. Besides her native AuSable River area, one of her favorite travel destinations is Africa. She is also enjoys traveling the country’s beautiful west.

Kim is a Master Wildlife artist in the internationally acclaimed Society of Animal Artists. She is also an Associate Master in the Artist Renewal Center, a contemporary guild of the world’s best representational artists. She is a Signature member of the National Oil and Acrylic Painters Society, and an appointed member in the Allied Artists of America. She has one the Michigan Duckstamp in 2001, the Wyoming Fish and Game Stamp in 2014 and most recently won the Montana Migratory Bird Stamp for 2026.

Artist Links

Visitors can experience Kim Diment’s work at the 55th Annual Waterfowl Festival in Easton, Maryland, this November.