TIM SHINABARGER

About this artist

From an early age, Tim Shinabarger developed an obsession with wildlife and wild places. He took a few art classes while attending Eastern Montana College where he received a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Business. He furthered his art education by attending workshops by prominent artists and studying the works of past masters. Tim also has a background in taxidermy and in the past worked as a guide, backcountry ranger and forest fire fighter. Following in the footsteps of such pathfinders as Carl Rungius and Belmore Brown, Shinabarger makes regular pilgrimages into the wilderness to gather ideas for new works. In order to convey the essence of his elusive subjects, he says it is necessary to put himself in a position to directly observe them in the wild.

Indeed, be it the Brooks Range in remotest Alaska where he has spent weeks trailing Grizzly bears and migrating caribou; the Wrangle Range where he has ascended the rugged crags in search of Dall Sheep; the red rock canyons of Utah where he has plied the shadows in search of mule deer; or the vast greater Yellowstone ecosystem in his own back yard where he has ambled after moose and majestic wapiti, his wanderings fail to quench an endless thirst for wildlife and wild places.

In 2015, he was featured in the Best of the Best Contemporary Wildlife Exhibition and Sale at the Woolaroc Museum in Bartlesville, Oklahoma.  In 2014, he won the Major General and Mrs. Don D. Pittman Wildlife Award at the Prix de West and a Bronze Medal at the National Sculpture Society’s annual awards exhibition.  His other accolades include being a four-time winner of the coveted James Earle Fraser Sculpture Award at the Prix de West and earning similar distinctions from the National Sculpture Society, the National Museum of Wildlife Art, and the Society of Animal Artists.