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Veryl Goodnight has dedicated her life to exploring the relationships between humans and animals through bronze sculptures and oil paintings. As a wildlife rehabilitator, horse owner, and dog lover, Goodnight shares her life with animals that often become models. Veryl's extensive body of work includes over 200 unique sculptures, 20 monuments and countless paintings. Her award-winning art has been displayed throughout the country at museums, zoos, universities, presidential libraries, and in places as far-reaching as Beijing and Botswana. A large format hardcover book titled ""NoTurning Back - The Art of Veryl Goodnight,"" was published in 2011 to correspond with a forty-year retrospective at the Gilcrease Museum inTulsa, Oklahoma. She was inducted into the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame in 2016 for a lifetime of representing the American West in her art. Her best known monument, ""The Day the Wall Came Down,"" is a larger-than-life bronze depicting five horses leaping over the crumbled Berlin Wall. There are two ""sister castings"" of this 7-ton monument - one outside the Allied Museum in Berlin, Germany and one at the Presidential Library in College Station, Texas. A Colorado native, Veryl's career started as a wildlife painter in the early 1970's. She began sculpting to educate herself about anatomy. Sculpture then dominated her career throughout the late 1900's while she and her husband, Roger Brooks, lived in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Their 2006 move back to Colorado fulfilled a lifetime desire to live in the mountains. Their property is situated between 11,900' Helmet Peak and Mesa Verde National Park. The Middle Mancos River, complete with intermittent resident beaver, creates a natural wildlife preserve and constant inspiration. The spectacular surroundings expedited Veryl's return to oil painting. Sled Dog races in the surrounding San Juan National Forest opened a new chapter in Veryl Goodnight's five decades long career. Helen Hegener founded Northern Light Media in 2007 and has published many nonfiction books about the history of Alaska, producing not only more than two dozen books of her own, but also publishing books by many other writers. In an article for the Anchorage Daily News, January 5, 2024, historian and author David A. James wrote, ""Hegener's work delves into the building of the Alaska Railroad, the Depression-era establishment of the Matanuska Valley Colony, the state's historic roadhouses, and, most prominently, sled dogs and the mushers who work with them. She's arguably Alaska's foremost chronicler of the sport's history, having written books about the Iditarod, Yukon Quest, All Alaska Sweepstakes, and more.""
