Portrait in Powder

Hiding Inside every skier is a bit of mad artist with a passion for cutting patterns in the snow. Problem is, the slope must be untracked, like a giant white canvas, and such hills are hard to find. But there is one, maybe the best In America, at Jackson Hole, Wyo., and on a recent morning in a perfect setting of sun and new powder 15 two-man teams carved it up, each team cablestitching the slope in a free-swinging 30 seconds. The result was a skier's delight, and perhaps that explains the part about the mad artist: one more snowfall and that big, beautiful picture is gone forever.

PHOTO

FLETCHER MANLEY