About three decades ago, artist Shirl Ireland won two tickets to fly anywhere in the United States. Ireland recalls she and her husband decided, “Well, if they’re free, we should go as far away as we can.”  And that was Eugene — gateway to the Oregon Coast — where they camped their way north along the coast before flying home to the Adirondacks in northeastern New York from Seattle.

The coast, as it tends to do, it stayed with her. A little more than a year ago, Ireland, who has been featured on National Geographic, PBS, and BBC in documentaries about plein air painting, left her home and studio overlooking Yellowstone National Park in Montana and moved to Manzanita on Oregon’s North Coast. She recently hung her first exhibit in Oregon, Ode to Mother Nature, at the NCRD Gallery in Nehalem. It will be on display through Dec. 31.

The show – a mix of small paintings and ones up to 4 by 6 feet – focuses primarily on birds and landscapes, many of them metaphorical, Ireland said. It’s “all about appreciating Mother Nature in a metaphorical way.”

In one painting, a heron takes off in rough weather, while another stands watching.  In text next to the work, Ireland explains the backstory for the painting, which she titled C’est la Vie: “I am an empty nester. He’s leaving and I’m staying. I call them painting paragraphs – I post them next to the painting. There’s another with two geese gliding out into the water, and the babies are in the shadows, following them. That, to me, was coming into motherhood. That transition of being single without kids, then being a mother; from the shadows to the light.”

I talked with Ireland about the show, her new life on the Oregon Coast, and what’s next. The interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

On your website, you talk about knowing you wanted to paint since you were 4 years old, after your parents took you to Yellowstone National Park. Was there someone who nurtured you or helped shape you into an artist at such a young age?

Ireland: No, it feels like I just came in with it. I never questioned it. I can’t explain it, but I was stamped “artist” right off the bat. I fell in love with the art cart when it was wheeled into my first-grade classroom. I was hooked. Nature and art have been passions since.

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You went to college in the Adirondacks, studied fine art, design, and education, and, as many artists looking to make a living do, took a job teaching. But that didn’t quite work out. What happened?

Things really started taking off when I was teaching, and I just couldn’t do it all. So, I let the [art] client make that decision. They probably don’t even know they did, but they wanted me to do this big project, and I thought, “There is just no way I can do all of this.”  I gave the client the price of their project, which was the price of the rest of my year teaching. I thought, “Well, if they take it, I guess I will put in my notice, and if they don’t, I’ll continue teaching.”  And they took it.

From your paintings and your blog, it’s obvious you have a great love for your former home overlooking Yellowstone National Park. What was it that sparked the move here?

A natural disaster –historical flooding in June 2022. The roads were all washed out. Our gallery and studio were affected. Our town was a peninsula. It kind of shook up our lives. My daughter is in college at Lewis & Clark, and I’ve always liked this area. We’d also considered the Pacific Northwest before we moved to Montana in 2007. We were looking to move west and had honed in on a couple of places, and the northern Oregon Coast was one of them. We had a Realtor in Cannon Beach, the whole deal. We were looking pretty hard.

What stopped you?

We were afraid of the winters. We were going from the Adirondack Mountains, which is like pure snow, and everybody talking about how rainy it is here, and I just wasn’t sure. I didn’t know if we should just go straight from the Adirondacks to here.  And then we ran into this brave, big thing that happened in Montana — property just fell in our lap, and it was like, “Well, I guess we go to Montana.” Then, the natural disaster happened in Yellowstone, and I said, “Let’s look at the Pacific Northwest again.”

So now that you’ve been here through all four seasons, what do you think of the weather?

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It’s awesome.  Like my daughter said, it’s way better than storm and ice. We’re loving the weather here; it’s so mild compared to what I am used to. It doesn’t seem particularly rainy to me. It’s more rainy than Montana, but you can get out every day.

What about the wind?

There is a town not too far from where I used to live where the wind would blow tractor-trailers off the highway. It doesn’t seem too windy here. You really can’t paint in strong winds.

What is catching your eye here most as an artist?

I’ve been wandering around trying to figure that out. I like birds. Now I’m getting into trees. The other thing I like a lot is to roam around and look for old barns. There are a lot of good barns around.

What’s next?

I’m exploring trees to draw as portraits, highlighting their “winter bones.” I just started painting a very interesting Gothic building, a small family mausoleum … and a few Tillamook County barns have been waiting for me. I’m also in the midst of a new venture into fabric design, as I’m putting together a collection for a fabric manufacturer specializing in the quilting market. Another thing I’m working on is a children’s book about painting outside, and the adventures that can ensue. My daughter is helping me illustrate the book. If all goes well, it will be out in 2025.

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Last question: Do you think you’ll stay here?

My son also just went to Lewis & Clark. My daughter’s trying to get her master’s in architecture. So, we’re a pretty strong Lewis & Clark family at this point.  They’re going to be here for a while, and it will be fun to be involved with my kids through their college years.