mephotoproject Archives | Page 2 of 2

March 9, 2015

Let’s talk about summer

Sunset off Schoodic Point. Just another day in Paradise.

I’m going to be speakingabout New York painters and their relationship with the Maine Coast at the Moore Auditorium in Acadia’s Schoodic Institute on August 12. This is scheduled concurrently with my workshop at Schoodic from August 9 to 14. The talk is free, and if you’re in mid-coast Maine that week, I hope you join us.

There are four spots left in the workshop. Last year I erred in letting a few extra people sign up, on the assumption that someone would drop and it would all work out. That didn’t happen, and we had too many painters. This year, I’m holding the line strictly at 12 participants, so if you want to come, I recommend you hold a place. From past experience, I’m confident that this workshop will sell out.

Painting the view from Mt. Battie during last summer’s workshop.

We have designed this workshop to include room and board so you can concentrate on painting. Schoodic is an unspoiled gem of the Atlantic coast. Pounding surf, stunning views of Cadillac Mountain, and veins of dark basalt running through red granite rocks are the dominant features of this “road less traveled” in Acadia National Park. Pines, birch, spruce, cedar, cherry, alder, mountain ash, and maples forest the land. There are numerous coves, inlets and islands. And your private room, shared bath, room and board and instruction are just $1150.

Some of last year’s participants asked for more surf, so I went up to Acadia and got them more surf. But they won’t get crowds; Schoodic is the quiet side of this monumentally popular park.

My long-term monitor, Sandy Quang, will not be with us at Acadia this year. She has finished her MA in art history and is working at Christie’s in New York this week, the beginning of her career in curating art. We will enjoy the time we have left with her here in Rochester while knowing that she’s on to bigger and better things. Sandy has studied on and off with me for ten years, and it’s a bittersweet parting. “You give them roots and you give them wings,” someone remarked to me last week. One thing I’m sure of: Sandy will be a painter for the rest of her life.

Stacey painting on a floating dock last summer.

Click here for more information on my Maine workshops! Download a brochure here.

February 26, 2015

Frozen beauty

Thin sheet ice at the harbor in Baltimore, MD. (Photo courtesy of Emerson Champion.)

The Great Lakes are a continuous channel of fat parts (the lakes) and straits (the Niagara, St. Lawrence and St. Mary’s Rivers and the Straits of Mackinac). A sort of inland sea, they contain 21% of the world’s surface fresh water by volume. Because they are huge and deep, they never fully freeze, and they even have small tides.

We all know that lake water starts to freeze at 32° F. The salty ocean’s freezing point is more like 28° F., but of course the ocean is vast (even vaster than Lake Ontario) so at our latitude it only freezes around the edges.

Orange peel ice developing on the Patapsco River shipping channel in Baltimore, MD. This is brackish water in a shallow cove. (Photo courtesy of Emerson Champion)

Still, the Great Lakes form some features usually associated with sea ice. Ice hummocks and pressure ridges, pancake ice, grease ice (which is basically ice soup), and ice stuck fast along the shores with open channels, or leads, are all features of both sea and Great Lakes ice. As long as the lakes don’t freeze, they also have the same drift ice that one sees on the ocean.

Ice balls on the shore of Lake Michigan. These are caused by rolling surf.

Ice coverage on the Great Lakes reached 85.4% on Feb. 18, making this the second winter in a row that it has exceeded 80%. That’s the first time that’s happened since the 1970s. As usual, Lake Ontario is the slowest to freeze; as of yesterday, it was at near-record levels, being 82.6% covered.

Pancake ice looks like blood platelets and is a common enough formation on Lake Ontario. Sometimes the edges build up enough that the pieces look like kettles.

This much ice is highly unusual. But this is the second cold winter in a row, and the lake never fully warmed up last summer.

Flow ice near Brooksville, ME.

In terms of comfort, it’s difficult: Buffalo is recording its coldest February in the 145 years in which records have been kept, and the whole northeast has been buried in snow. Ice is, of course, beautiful, but we’re all starting to look forward to the grey, rotten ice that heralds Spring.

Fast ice is ice that’s stuck on the edges of open water.

Let me know if you’re interested in painting with me on the Schoodic Peninsula in beautiful Acadia National Park in 2015 or Rochester at any time. Click here for more information on my Maine workshops! Download a brochure here.

February 25, 2015

This blog is on a two-hour snow delay

Shadow on Frankfort Barren, 1982, Neil Welliver

Last week was historically the coldest week of the year. That should be a relief, but we’ve got at least another week of subzero weather on the forecast. The whole northeast has struggled with snow and extreme cold this winter. Anyone who watches the weather recognizes this as a reprise of last year, and wonders if we’re entering an extreme cold cycle.

Unyarded Deer, Neil Welliver.

Nevertheless I generally like winter, and I particularly like the paintings of Neil Welliver.

Welliver studied at Yale with abstract painters Burgoyne Diller and Josef Albers. He went on to teach at Cooper Union, Yale, and Penn.

Cold Claudia, 1969, Neil Welliver. Too often the figures in his mid-period paintings look like empty spaces around which the landscape crowds. To me that’s an unconscious attempt to get past the academic idea that the figure is the highest representation of painting.

While teaching at Yale, Welliver dropped abstraction in favor of realistic landscape painting. In the early 1960s he began vacationing in Maine, where he began integrating figure in the landscape. In 1970 he moved permanently to Lincolnville, ME. Shortly thereafter, his mature style was born.

Welliver based his huge finished works on plein air sketches done in the wood and coastline near his home.

Study for Allagash Ice Flow, 1997, Neil Welliver.

“Painting outside in winter is not a macho thing to do. It’s more difficult than that. To paint outside in the winter is painful. It hurts your hands, it hurts your feet, it hurts your ears. Painting is difficult. The paint is rigid, it’s stiff, it doesn’t move easily. But sometimes there are things you want and that’s the only way you get them,” he said.

February 18, 2015

Gone shopping

A good studio-center location should have rocks and sea and sunsets…

Yesterday I wrote about my property search this week in Maine. What does this mean for my painting and my students?

I’ve worked with some fine properties over the years. Unfortunately, some have gone out of business and some have changed their business structure. Furthermore, it’s unfair to expect hotels to welcome paint and turps slopped on their meeting-room carpeting. A studio is a godsend in inclement weather and for critique or instruction. That is easy enough in Rochester, but has been difficult in Maine.

It should have lighthouses, like this one painted by Nancy Woogen at Marshall’s Point in 2013.

I’m not interested in running my own inn, so there has to be ample housing at all price points. It must be a short drive to great painting sites, because nobody wants to spend all day in the car. And the studio needs to be light, bright, and large enough to accommodate 12-14 students.

It should have quiet, wooded places.

Whether I’ve found that property remains to be seen. In the meantime, I’m having surgery on my eyes today, so all real estate transactions are on temporary hiatus.

And it should have boats in all states. These are by me.

An aside: my 18-year-old son toured properties with me, patiently analyzing and considering them. On the way home I attempted to stop at LL Bean’s outlet in Freeport, but five minutes in a clothing store and he was done. Men!

February 17, 2015

Driving, me crazy!

Rainy Day on Penobscot Bay, oil on canvas, 10X8.

Yesterday morning was so cold that the electronics in my Prius failed. My husband, a computer programmer, held down the power button for fifteen seconds and it rebooted. What motivates a person to be in Maine in these conditions?

I am in search of real estate. I have delightful friends who have hosted me when I’ve taught and worked here, but the time has come to acquire my painting studio in Maine.

That same scene this morning. No way am I walking down to the water.

Most people start at the kitchen when touring a property. I start with the outbuildings, because the studio is what’s important. I’ve found a great agent here who understands this—Jackie Wheelwright of Legacy Properties Sotheby’s International Realty in Camden.

Together we’ve floundered around in a lot of snow. February is a tough time to buy property in the northeast, and this February has been particularly bad. I can’t see the roofs and I can’t get to the outbuildings without my ski poles and a good deal of swearing.

I may not care about cooking but I’m always a sucker for a good little woodstove.

February 16, 2015

Just this

The Sea of Ice (Das Eismeer), 1823-24, Casper David Friedrich. Imagine that’s the MassPike, and my wee little Prius on the right…

This weekend I drove to Maine in a blizzard. No, it wasn’t the Snowpocalypse that had been predicted by breathless news readers, but it was a nice New England ripper of a snowstorm.

I love the fantastical twisted ice of springs along the road in winter. If I can ever get a good photo, I will paint them.

After the snow stopped falling, my trusty Prius was raked by cross winds that carved and winnowed the snow into fantastical shapes. It reminded me strongly of Casper David Friedrich’s The Sea of Ice.

Note to self: it’s never a good sign when you’re traveling in the same direction as the convoys of power trucks.

Almost unbelievably, I made it to Damariscotta in time for my appointment Sunday afternoon. When I parked for the night, the temperature was 5° with 40 mph gusts. But, Mother Nature, you are a crank indeed! That was warmer than it was at home in Rochester.

Let me know if you’re interested in painting with me on the Schoodic Peninsula in beautiful Acadia National Park in 2015 or Rochester at any time. Click here for more information on my Maine workshops! Download a brochure here.

February 5, 2015

All good things

It’s helpful when you can stay on the right side of the road. It wasn’t alway possible.

As I toured the Institute grounds, the first fat flakes started to fall. I’d been warned that a significant storm was expected at midday and would move in fast. I don’t have studded snow tires; I don’t even have snow tires. For a few minutes, I thought I’d left it for too late.

The first sign of the weather changing was the wind picking up.

Still, Western New Yorkers are accustomed to snow. Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse have the highest snowfall of all American cities. Our storms are amplified by the open water of the Great Lakes.

Drift ice is among my favorite things.

Coastal Maine adds a fillip to the experience: a fine layer of ice under its snow. The first twelve miles of our trip was on back roads that wouldn’t see a salter or plow for a day or so. The Mainers might have been slithering sideways on the hills in their pickup trucks (which are notoriously bad on snow) but they were taking it in stride. So did my little Prius.

Snow-covered rocks off Blueberry Hill.

The northeast is having its second hard winter in a row. Very few people visit Maine in January, but it is beautiful. I no longer do much wintertime plein air work. Still, our world is lovely in the deep snow.

The open road doesn’t look too bad, does it? But there’s absolutely no traction and my poor little Prius was choosing its own route.

Ah, home sweet home…

February 4, 2015

What drew them to Maine?

It’s all about the light…

In the mid-19th century working in natural settings and capturing natural light became particularly important to painters. The popularity of plein air painting increased with the introduction of pre-mixed paints in tubes and the rapid development of new, color-fast pigments.

And the granite outcroppings…

This movement arose more or less simultaneously around the world, including the Barbizon and Impressionist schools in France, the Newlyn painters in England, the Group of Seven painters in Canada, the Heidelberg School in Australia, and the Hudson River School in New York.

And the untouched wilderness…

A national awareness of Maine’s striking landscape was raised in large part by the Hudson River School artists. Thomas Cole, Frederic Church and Thomas Doughty were among the first nationally-known painters to capture Maine’s natural beauty.

At the time, New York was the unrivaled center of art in America, and the Hudson River painters were celebrities. Their paintings were travelogues for a nation hungry to learn about the vast, untamed wildernesses in their own country. It is no coincidence that they painted concurrently with our westward expansion and the first movements toward a national park system.

And the ocean breezes…

They established a tradition of urban artists finding inspiration in Maine. Born in Boston, trained and established in New York, Winslow Homer reached his artistic maturity in Maine. Many other painters have followed his lead, including George Bellows, Rockwell Kent, Edward Hopper, and Rackstraw Downes.

And the power and motion of the sea.

What impulse drove them to Maine? In part it was a desire to escape market-driven and competitive New York. It was also a response to the clear bright light, the bracing breezes, the constant motion of the sea, the sighing winds and the bending pines.

A storm sky forming over Mt. Desert Narrows.

February 3, 2015

Elvers and Pickled Wrinkles

Lobster traps in Corea, ME. This little burg will be on our agenda. It’s very much a working fishery town.

North of Ellsworth, ME, the Atlantic coast veers away into a different world. Gone are the clamshacks, the art galleries, and the coffeeshops geared toward visitors from away. We’re now in working Maine.

Stunning rock outcroppings.

I passed a sign reading, “Elvers bought here.” It turns out that an elver is not a juvenile elf but a juvenile eel. If I had a pickup truck full of them, I’d be a wealthy woman, even though the price has dropped from its 2012 high of $2600/lb. to a more rational $400-600/lb. Although I’ve never heard of the things, in 2012 the statewide harvest was valued at more than $38 million, making it the second-most lucrative catch in Maine’s fisheries industry.

Our home-away-from-home.

I couldn’t take photos of the insides of our accommodations—the water and power is off, and there’s antifreeze in the toilets. But they’re four-bedroom duplexes, originally designed as Navy barracks. There are kitchens and sufficient bathrooms, but there will be no 600-thread-count sheets at this workshop. For those of you who have visited Ghost Ranch at Abiquiu, NM, this is very much the northeastern equivalent. It’s all about the sky and the landscape.

Last summer, Schoodic Institute hosted a stone sculpture symposium. This is carved granite, in front of Morse Auditorium at the Institute.

Because we’re back of beyond, our workshop includes all meals. However, there is a good pub in Winter Harbor—the Pickled Wrinkle—that you should visit on your way home.

The Dining Hall is stripped for winter, but there’s a wonderful view.

Acadia seems to be everyone’s darling recently. See Good Morning America’s video, here, and USA Today’s reporting, here. In anticipation of increased visitation, the Park Service is busy upgrading the fabric of the place, including newly-paved roads. In a few years, you’ll be able to look down your nose and tell people, “I was there before it was cool.”

Very much working Maine.

(One of my students asked me whether there’s a ferry from Schoodic to Bar Harbor. There is; it leaves from Winter Harbor.)

January 30, 2015

Heading north in slow stages

Frozen paints…

…lead to a frozen sketch.

A week ago today, I drove up the Maine coast in slow stages. Maine is beautiful in winter, but it’s not the same kind of beauty as in August. Mid-coast Maine and Rochester have about the same winter temperatures. (As here, it gets colder the farther away from open water you go.) But there’s far more winter sun in Maine, and it creates the illusion of warmth.

Belfast tugs, last summer. That’s my student Brad Van Auken’s painting start.

I stopped in Belfast, ME for groceries, a gallery call, and a few moments of sketching at the harbor. Belfast often has tugs under repair in its boatyard, and it is a pretty place even in January. I pulled out my watercolor sketch kit and started a fast sketch of the pretty red boathouse. When my paints froze in the pan, it was a sign that I should move on.

North of Ellsworth, US 1 becomes a much quieter, more contemplative road.

After Ellsworth, ME (the turn-off to Bar Harbor), US 1 becomes a much quieter road, especially in winter. My goal was to arrive in Winter Harbor by dusk. After a quick trip out to Schoodic Point to catch the winter sun setting over the ocean, I settled in for the night.

Sun setting over Schoodic Point.

Not wanting to head into Winter Harbor for a pub meal, I was forced to cook myself dinner. I reminded myself that wine goes with everything, and soldiered on.

Wine goes with everything.