Before fame came

Illustrator Shannon Cartwright's 23 Alaska-themed children's books -- "Mammoth Magic," "Alaska ABC Book," "Kiana's Iditarod," "Danger: The Dog Yard Cat," etc. -- have sold nearly 2 million copies. Living a wilderness life with her husband, Gary Pinard, in the Talkeetna Mountains, she is highly sought and well-known on the Alaska literary scene.

Still her most recent book, "Finding Alaska: The Life and Art of Shannon Cartwright," (Greatland Graphics, $19.95) caught us by surprise. Much of the amply illustrated volume details how she goes about researching each of the children's stories she illustrates.

But the early chapters reveal a Cartwright we've never known, from the years before she called herself an Alaskan, or a children's illustrator. The pre-ABC paintings and jewelry are the work of a mature -- if light-hearted -- artist. The anthropomorphism of natural features and animals that would become a hallmark of her work for young readers can be seen, but without the context of a narrative they stand by themselves.

"Finding Alaska" has been named to the 2009-10 Alaska Battle of the Books. With the permission of the publisher, we here present some samples of the previously unseen art in its pages, along with Cartwright's description of her first encounter with Alaska.

I grew up in the suburbs on the north side of Detroit. It was a big city even in the 1950s. The night sky was obscured by streetlights and buildings, so I grew up very unaware of nature, the moon, and of the life cycles of plants and animals.

When I was four years old, my grandfather started taking my brother and me to the Detroit Zoo on weekends. After a long day, I'd go home and draw all my favorite animals such as bears, ostriches and tigers.

One of my grandmothers was a public health nurse in Kotzebue, Alaska, for 15 years during the '40s and '50s. She traveled from village to village, sometimes by dog team, sometimes by bush plane. She sent me an Eskimo yo-yo, a Billiken necklace, gold nugget necklaces and other gifts over the years. I was the only kid in my elementary school who wore mukluks in the winter!

One summer I met a boy named Ross Hickman whose parents owned a vacation cabin in northern Michigan. We became constant companions in our free time, sailing, boating and waterskiing. He showed me a whole new side of life outside the city.

After graduation from the University of Michigan where I majored in advertising and illustration, I took a job at an advertising firm in Ann Arbor. Since I was the new hire, I was assigned projects the others didn't want, like designing thermos bottles and packaging for boxes of screws. I hated it. Ross had one more year of school, so I had to tough it out.

After Ross graduated, we married. He agreed to move out west. We sold everything, bought a Toyota Land Cruiser, loaded it up with our few belongings and drove off to start our life together.

All those stories from my Grandma and reading her Alaska magazines finally triggered something. We looked at maps and picked Valdez for a destination because it looked like it was surrounded by mountains. We were right; there were mountains everywhere and Valdez was gorgeous. However, it was a very small town and we quickly determined that the chance of Ross getting the job he wanted was pretty close to zero so, we headed for Anchorage.

For lodging, we temporarily stayed at a campground at Goose Lake. Ross eventually got a job as a counselor in an alcohol addiction treatment program and I did maid work at the Anchorage Westward Hotel.

We bought a little 11x20-foot house in Eagle River. Eagle River was just a tiny town along a quiet two-lane road. I remember there being a few gas stations, a post office and a liquor store. It took about 45 minutes to drive to Anchorage.

Our house was out the unpaved Eagle River Road and was perched halfway up a mountainside. There was just enough space carved out of the slope for the house and an outhouse. There was no television, telephone or running water, but the views were incredible. I could see the Eagle River Valley, the Chugach and Alaska Ranges, and Cook Inlet. We were on the edge of heaven! My parents thought this was just a phase I was going through. Little did we know that it would become a way of life.

I was completely overwhelmed by my new surroundings. I climbed the mountain almost every day, both summer and winter, no matter what the weather. I didn't want to miss a thing. Sometimes I spent the night on top of the mountain so I wouldn't miss out on anything such as a fabulous sunrise. There were always new clouds, new colors and new flowers. At first I thought that wildflowers bloomed all at once, but I discovered that new wildflowers on my mountainside bloomed all summer long. That first year was a real eye opener -- nature astonished me!

Most of all I fell in love with the mountain tops. I'd sit among them for hours and hours every day. The mountains, along with the sun and moon, became my inspiration and subject matter for my paintings.

In winter, we were often above the clouds surrounded by a puffy sea of white. Since we were above this inversion layer, the mountains would look like mushrooms with narrow stems. Other times they would appear to be floating with no base. In my early paintings, my mountains had faces to talk to each other.

I did more than sketches and painting -- I was also experimenting with sculptures, jewelry and weaving. I walked the land and looked for things to incorporate into my artwork; I loved finding things in nature such as bones, horn, beaver-carved wood, seaweed, stones, driftwood, shells, feathers and rocks. These could be fashioned into sculptures or jewelry.

I also made clay bead necklaces, pots, and sun-and-moon-themed salt-and-pepper shakers, almost all of which had carved faces.

I sold artwork at the Old Store Gallery in Anchorage, had a few art shows at the Artique Gallery and continued working with sculpture and jewelry. Sometimes I studied the paintings at the Anchorage Museum for hours at a time.

One day a friend of mine, Dick Koskovich, took me on a drive out the Glenn Highway. We stopped at an overlook and, while handing me his binoculars, he said, "Look, check out the sheep up there." I hadn't realized that there were animals in the mountains. The animals weren't living in a zoo -- they were living where I was! Now I couldn't wait to begin including animals in my artwork.

I decided that I needed to live a simpler life and get closer to the land. I wanted to get away from the roads and the city noise and move out to the bush. Ross and I began looking at places for sale. Since his dream was to go to law school, he decided we could buy some land, build a cabin and then he would come visit me whenever possible. So it was not to be. We realized that we had different dreams and had to part ways.

I knew it would be hard to live in the bush and get set up in a studio where I could fire my clay sculptures, so I decided that I needed to find someone who could teach me woodcarving.

One day in 1976, a friend of mine said, "I know a woodcarver. I'll take you to meet him." We drove down to Hope where he introduced me to Gary Pinard.

Here was this incredible artist living in a little cabin carving soapstone animals for Christmas presents. He was also a guide in the Alaska Range and, best of all, his dream was to live off the land. We became fast friends. It wasn't long before I moved to Hope and we later married.

Gary was born in Alaska and grew up on a beautiful hillside just south of Anchorage. We eventually built a cabin along the Alaska Railroad in the Talkeetna Mountains.

For more than 25 years, Gary and I have spent the month of November doing craft shows in Anchorage, Fairbanks and Wasilla. Here we display all our books, notecards, posters, prints and artwork. It is a long time to be in town but it is also good to see family and friends. We also get to meet our fans and their parents -- it's so rewarding to have kids come up and sing the whole "Twelve Days of Summer" or a song from the "Thunderfeet" book or to see a two-year-old clutching one of my board books.

After a trip to town of any length, it feels good to get back home to our cabin in its magical setting. We can haul water, use the outhouse, spend lots of time outdoors, and see if the ducks are still in our pond. The peace and quiet is good for the soul.

I was often bored living in Detroit but I don't know how anyone could be bored living in Alaska. If you are, turn off your computer and television, head outdoors and take time to look around, listen and smell. I am sure you will find something interesting.