Drama at Bear Lake, Erik Stensland

By Doug Fox
ESTES PARK
“It’s vast, it’s gorgeous, it’s magnificent and really unexplored by most people,” is the way photographer Erik Stensland of Estes Park describes Rocky Mountain National Park. To mark the park’s 100th anniversary next year, Stensland has authored a book featuring many of his amazing photographs of the park.

“Wild Light” captures the incredible beauty of Rocky Mountain National Park in every season, in all kinds of light, from its bold mountain tops bedecked with snow to its gentle, soft flowers of spring by a clear running river. Stensland says, “It’s all about wilderness. It’s also about photography and light, and the different nuances of light.”

The Estes Park Museum hosts a program with Stensland, Nov. 15 at 2 p.m. He will discuss the making of “Wild Light,” a collection of some of his favorite photographs taken in the park over the last 10 years. After his illustrated talk, there will be a reception and book signing.

Stensland calls Rocky Mountain National Park “a compact little jewel” with great diversity. “The grand heights, the marshy meadows down low, the diversity of wildlife—everywhere I look there’s something different to see and I feel like it’s a sort of an unexplored park.”

Over the last decade, Stensland has hiked most every trail in the park and seen places most tourists never get a chance to visit.

“My hope is that people who read this will realize there’s much more to this national park than they might have thought,” he said. “I want the beauty of nature and of this park to speak to people at a very deep level. I feel like beauty has a message it wants to speak to all of us, deep in the core of our being, and we can hear it during those times when we are alone out in the beauty of nature.”

Stensland’s photography can be seen and purchased at his shop, “Images of RMNP,” across from Bond Park in downtown Estes Park. Visit http://www.imagesofrmnp.com for more information on the photographer.