I’m Shauna Layton—painter, designer, storyteller, and Montana girl through and through.

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I was born and raised under the Big Sky, where family road trips meant camping, hot springs, ghost towns, and too many lakes to count. I earned my Fine Art and Graphic Design degree from Montana State University, then spent years building a career in design before life pulled me back to where it all began: a blank page, a paintbrush, and the state I love most.

 

I rediscovered my love of painting thanks to a watercolor class I took with my 83-year-old mother. One of our first assignments was to paint a piece inspired by a song. I chose “That’s My Daughter in the Water,” and painted my daughter, Lula, on a hot July night at Seeley Lake, Montana. That painting went on to be featured in a gallery exhibit at First Night Missoula this past February. It’s one of my proudest pieces—not just because of the brushwork, but because of the story it tells.

 

These days, I paint from memory, photos, and feeling—capturing places that are hard to explain unless you’ve stood there. My dog Simon has been my shadow for 17 years, and painting him became a kind of homecoming.

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Whether it’s the Wilma sign, a dusty bar in Livingston, or Polebridge, Mont. every brushstroke is part of Montana’s story—and mine.