“It’s a good life, being an artist,” Len Chmiel says as he admires the view from the front porch of his studio. “There’s no other job I’d like … other than maybe a landscape designer.” Fortunately for Chmiel, his extensive acreage in picturesque Hotchkiss, Colorado, affords him the opportunity to do both. Besides creating award-winning paintings, he is also a gardener, winemaker, beekeeper, archaeologist, ranger, and wrangler of a small flock of chickens. Oh, and he also frames his own paintings. Chmiel’s studio, an 800-square-foot structure he designed himself, is the centerpiece of his 23-acre property, which sits atop a
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