STORY BY KAREN BOSSICK

PHOTOS COURTESY OF FELI FUNKE

Ketchum fine arts photographer Feli Funke met Barbara Van Cleve when she attended a shoot for Robert Redford’s “The Horse Whisperer” on Van Cleve’s ranch in the shadow of the Crazy Mountains near Big Timber, Mont.

A feature writer for European publications, Funke was not as interested in Robert Redford as she was in the set’s horse trainer, Buck Brannaman. But she quickly became drawn to Van Cleve, a fifth-generation Montana rancher and Western photographer known for her depictions of contemporary western ranch life.

“I came to admire her warmth, grit, intelligence, her sense of humor, her talent,” said Funke. “She’s one of finest black and white photographers in the United States. Her gelatin silver tone photographs hand printed in her garage at Big Timber are timeless, portraying a West that is slowly disappearing. And she took many of the images from horseback while gathering cattle.”

Funke became fast friends with Van Cleve, even sharing a stage with her for several years at the Art of the Cowgirl festival where Van Cleve was teaching photography workshops and Funke was showing documentaries.

And when she heard that Livingston, Mont., filmmaker Cynthia Matty-Huber was making a documentary on Van Cleve, she was quick to jump on board as creative and executive producer.

Their film “Hard Twist: Through the Lens of Barbara Van Cleve” will premiere at 2:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 4, at The Argyros in Ketchum as part of the Sun Valley Film Festival.

“We were so thrilled when we learned we had been accepted for the Sun Valley Film Festival because the competition for the film festival is very stiff. We were also thrilled because Barbara is 90 and going blind from macular degeneration,” said Funke. “The Sun Valley Film Festival is a super-professional film festival, and we thought it would be warm, welcoming and not overwhelming.”

“Hard Twist” explores the pain and beauty of ranch life in the American West through the lens of Van Cleve.

“I was 5 and my dad said, ‘You can be anything you want, sis,’ ” Van Cleve recounts in the documentary. “You just have to work and work.”

Van Cleve has a wicked sense of humor, Funke said.  She was already 90 when Filson representatives asked her to be a brand ambassador for their outdoor clothing company. Van Cleve didn’t hesitate when asked if she owned any Filson clothing.

“Sure,” she said, “I have my father’s Filson, my grandfather’s Filson. We grew up in Filson coats because we weren’t very wealthy.”

“She didn’t hesitate, even though her vision is greatly reduced,” Funke said. “She just said, ‘Yes.’ She’s taught me a lot about resilience, kindness, generosity and a deep love for the land.”

Like Van Cleve, Funke has long trained her lens and her pen on the American West.  She was born Felicitas Monty Funke in northern Germany, a third-generation member of the Funke Media Group—Germany’s third largest newspaper and magazine publisher with more than 500 publications in eight countries.

She got a double Master’s in journalism and American literature at schools in England and Canada. And, like so many Europeans, she grew up infatuated with the American West and the American Cowboy.

She fell in love with the magic of wide-open spaces without fences, lights, houses and roads while riding through Northern Nevada on a pack ride on assignment.

“To see the Milky Way from your sleeping bag—that changed my life, and that’s also when I found Ketchum, Idaho,” said Funke who was steered to Sun Valley 30 years ago by cowboy friends who told her that’s where all the Europeans were.

In 2001 Funke wrote a coffee table book called “Gathering Remnants: A Tribute to the Working Cowboy” that featured a forward by Sun Valley’s cinematic cowboy Clint Eastwood, an introduction by conservationist Gretel Ehrlich and photographs by Kendall Nelson.

Nelson and John Plummer followed that up in 2020 with a 50-minute documentary by the same name that asked whether the traditional cowboys’ way of life will survive the 21st century. Funke told her own story in “Cowboys—A Documentary Portrait” the following year.

“We lucked out from a timing standpoint with ‘Yellowstone.’ A lot of people did not believe that ‘Yellowstone’ was authentic. As they were looking for authenticity, they found ‘Cowboy: A Documentary Portrait.’ ”

As a member of the Sun Valley Film Festival’s Founder’s Circle, Funke’s passion is the next generation. On Saturday at 11:45 a.m. during the Idaho Shorts block she will give out a $5,000 prize to the winner of the 1 Potato Award, which recognizes young Idahoans that are making films.

“I love making documentaries, but I am equally passionate about supporting the next generation,” she said. “I want to give young Idahoans who are creative storytellers a platform where they share their films. We just need to support them in their creativity and that’s why the film festival such an important platform because they get to mingle with people in the industry and make their first contacts.”

Thanks to modern technology, young filmmakers no longer need a busload of people to make a good film, Funke said.

“We are in spectacular hands. Today’s young filmmakers are very attentive, fearless. They are capable, are completely relaxed about all the cool technology. They come to the table and have a very intuitive approach towards editing. That said, all the technology in the world is no good unless you have a good story.”