James Niehues (born 1946) is an American

landscape artist Landscape painting, also known as landscape art, is the depiction of natural scenery such as mountains, valleys, trees, rivers, and forests, especially where the main subject is a wide view—with its elements arranged into a coherent composi ...

and cartographer best known for painting ski trail maps for ski resorts. He has painted 255 maps for 175 ski resorts around the world.

Early life

Niehues was raised on a farm in

Loma, Colorado Loma is an unincorporated town, post office, and census-designated place (CDP) located in and governed by Mesa County, Colorado, United States. It is part of the Grand Junction, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area. The Loma post office has the ZIP ...

, and attended

Fruita Monument High School Fruita Monument High School is a public high school located in Fruita, Colorado, United States, serving 10-12th grades. It is part of Mesa County Valley School District 51. History The first purpose-built high school building in Fruita was compl ...

. He began painting at the age of 15, when he fell ill with nephritis and his mother gave him an oil painting set to keep him occupied while he was bedridden for three months.

Career

After serving in the U.S. Army from 1965 to 1969, Niehues worked in advertising, printing and graphic design. In 1987, while working at a

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

print shop, he met Bill Brown, a painter of ski resort maps who was nearing retirement.The Man Behind Most of the Ski Maps in America
/ref> Brown gave him his first assignment as a map painter: a small inset map commissioned by

Winter Park Resort Winter Park Resort is an alpine ski resort in the western United States, in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado at Winter Park. Located in Grand County just off U.S. Highway 40, the resort is about a ninety-minute drive from Denver. History The mo ...

in Colorado. After his map was accepted by Winter Park, Niehues printed copies of his illustration and sent them to the marketing managers of ski resorts across the U.S. to advertise his map-painting services. The first resort to respond was

Vail Ski Resort Vail Ski Resort is a ski resort in the western United States, located near the town of Vail in Eagle County, Colorado. At , it is the third-largest single-mountain ski resort in the U.S., behind Big Sky and Park City, featuring seven bowls and ...

, which hired him to paint a new trail map. The first ski map that he designed and painted by himself was

Boreal Mountain Resort Boreal Mountain California is a ski area in Soda Springs, near the Lake Tahoe area of California. It has six chairlifts and two surface lifts, and offers the only night skiing in Tahoe, until 8 pm. It is owned by Powdr Corporation. Located o ...

in California; as of 2016, Niehues' map was still in use, 29 years after it was created. He retired completely in 2021. Niehues' method of painting ski trails begins with aerial photographs of the mountain that he either takes himself or obtains from Google Earth. He then sketches the mountain based on the photographs and adds color and detail with watercolor paints and an

airbrush An airbrush is a small, Pneumatics, air-operated tool that Atomizer nozzle, atomizes and sprays various media, most often paint but also ink and dye, and Foundation (cosmetics), foundation. Spray painting developed from the airbrush and is c ...

. By 2016, Niehues had painted 255 maps for 175 ski resorts around the world. The largest resorts he has painted for include

Aspen Aspen is a common name for certain tree species; some, but not all, are classified by botanists in the section ''Populus'', of the '' Populus'' genus. Species These species are called aspens: *'' Populus adenopoda'' – Chinese aspen (Chin ...

, Breckenridge,

Crested Butte Crested Butte is a prominent mountain summit in the Elk Mountains range of the Rocky Mountains of North America. The peak is in Gunnison National Forest, northeast by east ( bearing 59°) of the Town of Crested Butte in Gunnison County, Col ...

, Copper Mountain and Winter Park in Colorado,

Big Sky Resort Big Sky Resort is a ski resort in the western United States, located in southwestern Montana in Madison County. An hour south of Bozeman via U.S. Highway 191 in Big Sky, Montana, it is the second-largest ski resort in the United States by a ...

in Montana,

Boyne Mountain Resort Boyne Mountain Resort is a ski resort with a collection of accommodations in Northern Michigan located near Boyne City operated by Boyne Resorts. The center piece is an upscale resort called The Mountain Grand Lodge and Spa. Boyne Mountain has c ...

in Michigan,

Killington Ski Resort Killington Mountain Resort & Ski Area is a ski resort in Rutland County, Vermont, United States, near the town of Killington. It is the largest ski area in the eastern U.S., and has the largest vertical drop in New England at . Since the 2013– ...

in Vermont, Mount Bachelor in

Oregon Oregon () is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of its eastern boundary with Idaho. T ...

Sugarloaf A sugarloaf was the usual form in which refined sugar was produced and sold until the late 19th century, when granulated and cube sugars were introduced. A tall cone with a rounded top was the end product of a process in which dark molasses, a r ...

in Maine, and Mont Tremblant Resort and

Whistler Blackcomb Whistler Blackcomb is a ski resort located in Whistler, British Columbia, Canada. By many measures it is the largest ski resort in North America and has the greatest uphill lift capacity. It features the Peak 2 Peak Gondola for moving between ...

in Canada. He estimates that he has created trail maps for 75% of the large ski resorts in the U.S. In 2011, his work was displayed in an exhibition at

Apexart Apexart is a non-profit art space located in Manhattan, New York, that focuses on challenging the gallery system and democratizing the process by which art is curated and exhibited. The organization was founded by Steven Rand in 1994. Exhibi ...

in New York City. He semi-retired in 2014, and lives in Loveland, Colorado. Niehues' work has drawn numerous comparisons to famous artists: he has been called "the Michelangelo of snow", " Rembrandt of the ski trail", "

Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...

of the mountain", and the "

Norman Rockwell Norman Percevel Rockwell (February 3, 1894 – November 8, 1978) was an American painter and illustrator. His works have a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of Culture of the United States, the country's culture. Roc ...

of ski resorts". Niehues paints in

vellum Vellum is prepared animal skin or membrane, typically used as writing material. Parchment is another term for this material, from which vellum is sometimes distinguished, when it is made from calfskin, as opposed to that made from other anima ...

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Niehues, James 1940s births Living people 20th-century American artists 21st-century American artists 20th-century cartographers 21st-century cartographers Artists from Colorado American cartographers People from Mesa County, Colorado People from Loveland, Colorado Military personnel from Colorado United States Army soldiers