A TALE OF POSITIVE VISION

1952: A group of eleven artists formed an artist co-op and called themselves “Maine Coastal Artists.”  For 15 years, the cooperative rented space wherever they could near the central Maine coast.

1967: A New director was hired. Her first goal: to find a permanent home. The co-op purchased ($1650.) a vacant firehouse in Rockland, Maine, and renamed themselves the Center for Maine Contemporary Art.  They stayed in the firehouse for over 40 years in spite of a growing list of limitations - chief among them: out-of-the way location and increasing space squeeze.

Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockland

2010: Director change.  Suzette McAvoy is the former museum curator of the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland.  She convinced all “players” that it was time to think and act bigger.  Within two years, she had pledges for the $3M necessary to build the new state-of-the-art center.  An internationally renown architect - Toshiko Mori, Professor of Architecture at Harvard - agreed to design the facility at nearly no cost.

Main Gallery featuring painter John Walker - "From Seal Point"

The Center for Maine Contemporary Art opened in 2016 in the heart of Rockland just down the street from the Farnsworth Museum. It’s mission statement reads “to provide a catalyst for carrying forward Maine’s legacy in American art.”  

Numbers of visitors have gone from 9,000 per year to 35,000 with an expected increase to 50,000 this year.  It’s a small facility with one main gallery, two smaller ones, a classroom/art lab, small outdoor courtyard for sculpture and the usual lobby/gift shop and administration offices.  There is no permanent collection,therefore, no need for the demands of temperature controlled storage space and curatorial supervision. 

Rockland’s goal is to be known as Maine’s “art center.”  An “art corridor,” a cluster of privately owned art galleries, tie the Farnsworth Museum (their collection of Andrew Wyeth watercolors is a huge draw) with the CMCA down the street. Already, the Center and it’s first art exhibits have been reviewed by national newspapers and on-line art magazines.  It is listed among the top 10 places to visit on most Maine travel sites.

The power of vision!!   

Natural light from celestery windows (borrowed from Dia Beacon?)

A CASE FOR A STILL LIFE PAINTER

I say “Still life painting,” and you say?

“Dead ducks.”  “Bunch of flowers.”  “A table with magnifying glass, open book, candle.” 

You would be right! Artists have always painted “still lifes” (and yes, that’s the correct plural) because:  *arranged objects don’t move unlike human models, 
*there is no charge for objects and live models usually want something, 
*nobody cares what the weather is doing - critical consideration for landscape painters, 
*it’s an effective teaching exercise (Does the bowl I just painted look like the bowl in front of me and why not?), 
*and the artist has complete control of everything!  

Over the centuries, art theorists invested still life objects with psychological, political and religious meaning. Three of anything automatically gets an “aha! Holy Trinity.” That dead duck? Obviously, Jesus. Flowers point to an entire encyclopedia of human feelings so watch out! You may be painting a rose when you really might be feeling “tulip.”  I, myself, have been guilty of such parsing to which I now say “Balderdash!” A rose can be just a rose and three objects may be merely the painter’s penchant for trios.

JENNY BRILLHART in her studio

This week, during my trip to Maine, I discovered a still life artist whose paintings I liked so much that I bought two.  Jenny Brillhart lives and works in Stonington, Deer Isle, Maine. Stonington is at the very tip of Deer Isle and Deer Isle is about as isolated at anybody can get in the Continental U.S.A. I don’t know why she - or anybody else - would want to live there. It’s hard to reach by car even in summer - winter must be next to impossible. There is no shopping anywhere - and I mean NONE - for anything! Sure, it’s beautiful in that rocky- fir tree- morning fog kind of way but can’t you have that AND a Starbuck’s?

Anyway, Jenny paints still lifes in oil on something called Ypo which is a kind of plastic that looks like onionskin sheets but is stronger.  Sometimes, she paints on board or canvas. During a studio visit, I saw a suite of new work painted on fragments of cedar shingles.  I didn’t understand the significance of the shingles but at least there was no dead poultry! That would have been freakily weird.

I would call Jenny a graphic artist and sure enough, she works in that trade as a side profession. And she’s a minimalist - totally unlike those baroque dutch artists whose masterpieces overflow with metal, paper, wax, blood and flowers. Jenny constructs her stage sets from odd bits of paper and mechanical instruments that happen to lie around her studio.  The objects are posed like sad old maids, leaning against the wall waiting to be invited to dance. Only they don’t get asked.  Her color palette is somber: hues of grays, taupe, slate - the colors of fog - with only an occasional tiny slice of yellow or blue.

An environment of isolation, shrouded in misty colors of sea and fog: I sense the beginning of the intellectual critique. Title: “Place and Its Impact on Still Lifes.”

Oil on Ypo (artist: Jenny Brillhart) approx. 18" x 24"

Oil on Ypo (Jenny Brillhart) (approx 18" x 24")

Oil on wood, approx. 3'X5' (Jenny Brillhart)

THE SUMMERTIME BLUES

It’s summer and I don’t want to.

Enough with the gardening! I’ve weeded this same patch before. The first few times, I thought “Well! See how much better you look without those nasty weeds!” Now I think “Grow up. Fend for yourself. Snow will kill all of you soon so who gets the last laugh?”

BEAR FACES wallpaper - delicious!

Cooking too.  Cold weather inspires stews, soups, Italian dinners.  August inspires another trip to Subway.

I still clean house. It’s my generational curse. I’ve never had a housekeeper  or “help.”  It’s that deep mid/southwestern streak that says “never pay anybody for work you can do yourself.”  (The same philosophy keeps me from psychiatry, attorneys, any and all consultants. My husband has the same disease. For him it translates into yard work and snow removal.  He’s 78. Maybe it’s time to revisit. I’m younger but just as pissed off.)

hand-painted t-towels from...somewhere. I love the graphics!

It’s been awhile since I filed a new blogpost - I meant to be more methodical, more reliable, more serious (or is it sonorous?). I have copious notes on a new book teaching buddhist acceptance.  It says, in a nutshell, when bad times hit, don’t try to solve problems, or make them disappear.  Give up control. Begin with hopelessness. Be kind to yourself.

What? Give up control? Are you out of your mind?! Don’t try to solve problems? Are these people on drugs? Who are they anyway? O.K., I get the “be kind to yourself” thing.  I get expensive haircuts. As for the rest of it, what this country needs is a little MORE problem solving and taking a little MORE control.

Most of all, I don’t want to write about art. So I’m going to Maine for a few days.  Maybe there’s inspiration in all that crashing surf, rocky shores, lobster dinners. (Everybody’s supposed to LOVE lobster. Confession: I really don’t.  I mean…it’s o.k. but really? All the work and mess? Most lobster eaters just want an excuse to wallow in melted butter. Go buy corn on the cob…it’s cheaper and you get all that fiber.)

Before I leave, here are a few photographs I’ve saved from somewhere over the past year.  A new wall paper favorite - Bear Faces! Don’t you love it?

See you later. 

 (Painted houses in West Africa. And Painted flags..I think from Denmark? I was struck bu the repetition of graphic motif - repeated from half way around the world! Isn't that awe-inspiring?)