On a piece of rocky ground at the base of a steep bank along the mist-shrouded Little River, oil painter Olena Babak sets up her easel. It’s late in the day to be starting a new piece—less than three hours of sunlight remain—and Babak is fresh from an hours-long painting session in the Elkmont area of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. But something about the scene compels her.

“Sometimes it’s like an impulse,” she said. “Sometimes it’s contemplated. Sometimes, a scene sort of drags you in, and you need to figure out why.”

The Great Smokies offer a markedly different landscape than her home state of Maine. But Babak, like the 18 other artists participating in the fourth annual Plein Air Smokies event—this year hosted by the Great Smoky Mountains Institute at Tremont—found ample i

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