One of my very favorites is Seattle artist Mitch Albala : Barbara Benedetti-Newton moved from pretty colored pencil pices to stunning pastels landscapes. Richard McKinley is an incredible plein air pastelists As you can tell I like the work of pastelists, and Albala is someone I am hoping to take a class from someday. Wolf Kahn is a significant contemporary landscape painter. . .. probably one you may have heard of before. I agree with Hawkster that Albert Bierstadt is a remarkable landscape painter, perhaps my favorite in history, but he has been dead 106 years . . . making him a non-contemporary.
