Anselmi – “Artist’s Studio”, 2012, oil on paper
and collage

Fitzpatrick – “reciprocal 4/4″, 2013, monotyped, beeswax, etching ink, and aquacolor on kitikada paper

Campbell, “Maine Morning Mist,” 2011, acrylic on canvas

Portland – Daniel Anselmi from Belfast and Kristen Fitzpatrick from Portland have been named the 2013 Monhegan Island artists-in-residence by the Monhegan Artists’ Residency Corporation.

Thanks to a new initiative supported by the Maine Arts Commission, Melinda Campbell from Old Orchard Beach will take the first-ever art teacher residency offered by the program.

Fitzpatrick, a recent graduate of the Maine College of Art printmaking department, will be on Monhegan June 1-July 5; Anselmi, an abstract painter, August 31-October 4; and Campbell, a teacher in the Auburn School Department, July 6-20.

This year’s fellows will lodge in two new studio spaces, Elva’s Old P.O. and the Shumaker Cottage, both of which feature outdoor working spaces overlooking the island’s distinctive landscape.

Jurors for the 2013 residencies were Suzette McAvoy, director, Center for Maine Contemporary Art; Charles Melcher, associate professor for Graphic Design, Maine College of Art; and Virginia Sassman Rose, director, Rose Contemporary Gallery in Portland.

Noted Maine artists who have taken part in the Monhegan Artists Residency program include Marguerite Robichaux, Lynn Travis, and David Vickery, who will have a solo show at College of the Atlantic this summer. Two other past residents, Joe Kievitt and Alina Gallo, will be featured in the 2013 Portland Museum of Art Biennial.

Now in its 23rd year, the Monhegan Artist’s Residency program is supported by individual donations and grants from the Quimby Family Foundation, the Lida P. Underhill Trust, and the Maine Arts Commission.

For information, visit www.monheganartistsresidency.org

Thursday, December 20th, 2012

Wreck, oil on canvas, 24×22 inches, 2012

5pm – 8pm

Rising Tide Brewing Company

103 Fox Street, Portland, ME 04101

This fall, I spent five weeks working on Monhegan with an artist grant from the Monhegan Artists Residency Corporation. This show is a an exhibition of paintings and prints created during that time and later in my Yarmouth warehouse studio. Works range in size from 4 x 5 feet to 10 x 10 inches. Please join me for an evening of art and beer at Rising Tide Brewing Company in East Bayside. ~Emily Leonard Trenholm~

For more information and to preview images go to:

http://emilyleonardtrenholm.blogspot.com/

Portland -  This exhibition which runs December 7th through December 29th, is guest curated by CMCA curator emeritus Bruce Brown and calls attention to Maine’s lively and ever-growing fine art printmaking activities both by artists creating work in their own studios and especially at community-shared presses. “Fine art presses are alive and well in Maine and growing in numbers in recent years,” Brown contends.

In this show, there are two significant artists who have turned more seriously than ever to printmaking this yea. They are Kenny Cole of Monroe and Alan Bray of Sangerville. The recipient of a five week residency granted by the Monhegan Artists Residency Program, Cole essentially mastered the art of silkscreen printing on his own using basic portable equipment transported from home to Monhegan Island where he created 27 works this past Spring. Bray accepted an invitation from Tim Higbee who founded Hope Editions in 2008 to work together at the press in Hope for two weeks in September. Their collaboration resulted in “Ghosts,” Bray’s first lithograph in decades. Higbee has a recent lithograph and etching in the exhibition as well.

READ ENTIRE ARTICLE at www.maineartscene.com »

Juror for the show is artist Martha Miller, a Carina House Monhegan residency award winner, Maine College of Art faculty member, and well-known artist in over two dozen solo and invitational exhibitions in Maine, New Hampshire and California. Her work is in the Stephen and Tabitha King Foundation collection and the Aschenbach collection for San Francisco Museums. Among her recent solo shows are exhibitions at CMCA, University of New England, Maine College of Art, Katz Library at UMA, Mast Cove Galleries in Kennebunkport and several shows of former Carina House award recipients. Martha Miller has pursued an especial love of portraiture since her teens, developing a bold and expressive style and a flair for exciting mixed media.  She is a graduate of Maine College of Art.

The show is being presented at the River Arts gallery at 241 US Route 1 (north) in Damariscotta. River Arts is open 10am-4pm- Tuesday through Saturday and 10-2 on Sundays.   River Arts holds approximately 10 juried shows each year which are open to all Maine artists. The mission of River Arts is to nurture appreciation, encourage participation and provide opportunity in the arts.

Works from Monhegan Island
Emily Leonard Trenholm
MARC Residency Fellow

Open Studio
Fish House Lane, Monhegan Island, Maine
Saturday, September 29th, 2012
Reception: 7pm – 9pm
Preview: 1pm – 3pm or by Appointment
www.emilyleonardtrenholm.com

MONHEGAN – Gail Scott and Robert Stahl will present a slide talk on the James Fitzgerald Legacy Project at the Monhegan School House on Sunday, August 12, at 7:00 p.m. The talk is a benefit for the Monhegan Artists’ Residency (MARC).

In 2004, longtime Monhegan Island summer resident Anne M. Hubert bequeathed to the Monhegan Museum the estate of painter James Fitzgerald (1889-1971), including all his art work (drawings, sketches, watercolors, oils) and his house and studio (both of which had been designed and built by Rockwell Kent and eventually acquired by Fitzgerald). The James Fitzgerald Legacy Project promotes, documents and maintains Fitzgerald’s estate, including artwork and historic buildings.

Stahl is associate director of the Monhegan Museum and director of the Fitzgerald Legacy. Art historian and author Scott joined the Legacy committee in 2009 and is currently researching, visiting collections, and assessing Fitzgerald’s large body of work.

The talk will focus on Fitzgerald’s art and the history of Anne and Edgar Hubert’s patronage and support. The Huberts first met the painter in 1958 and purchased many works by him over the years. Stahl and Scott will also outline efforts of the Legacy to bring wider public attention to Fitzgerald’s art, life and contribution to American modernism.

Founded in 1989, the Monhegan Artists’ Residency program is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit supported by individual donors, art galleries, corporate sponsors and foundation grants. In addition to offering two five-week residencies each summer on Monhegan for emerging Maine artists, MARC presents public education programs.

For more information, visit www.monheganartistsresidency.org

A $5 suggested donation (at the door) will benefit MARC. To confirm time and date, call (207)-315-8233.

James Fitzgerald, Black Head, ca. 1954
Graphite & watercolor on paper, 31″ x 23″

A Slide Talk with
Robert Stahl, Legacy Director and
Gail R. Scott, Legacy Art Historian

Sunday, August 12, 2012, 7pm
Monhegan School House

Contribution at the door
Monhegan Artists Residency Program – $5

Painting at right: Portland Museum of Art.
Gift of Anne and Edgar Hubert, 1992.9.8

Sponsored by the Monhegan Artists Residency

Trenholm, Lake Mood II, 2011

PORTLAND—Kenny Cole, painter and installation artist from Monroe, and Emily Leonard Trenholm, a landscape artist from Portland, have been named the 2012 Monhegan Island artists-in-residence by the Monhegan Artists’ Residency Corporation (MARC).

A 1981 graduate of Pratt Institute, Cole has shown his work at a number of venues throughout the state, among them, the University of Maine Museum of Art, Space Gallery, and the Belfast Free Library. His imagery often makes reference to social, religious, and political issues.

Trenholm earned a BFA from the University of New Hampshire and an MFA from Boston University where she studied with John Walker. She responds to the natural world in an abstract and painterly fashion. She plans to paint on location while on Monhegan and also hopes to make watercolors and reduction block prints.

Kenny Cole, Mission Module, 2011

“We are pleased to be able to offer two five-week residencies on Monhegan this year,” said Susan Danly, chair of the MARC board. Grants from the Underhill, Quimby and Davis Family foundations support the program. The Monhegan Boat Lines will again provide free ferry passage for the artists.

The jury included June Fitzpatrick, June Fitzpatrick Gallery; Daniel Fuller, director, Institute of Contemporary Art, Maine College of Art; and sculptor Michael Shaughnessy, art teacher, University of Southern Maine.

Now in its 22^nd year, MARC is supported by individual donations and foundation grants. For information, visit www.monheganartistsresidency.org.

 www.bangordailynews.com

“The Quimby Family Foundation and MARC share a mission, to provide accessibility to art opportunities for Maine residents,” said Susan Danly, chair of the MARC board. “For well over a century, Monhegan has inspired great art, yet today an extended stay on the island is beyond the financial reach of most Maine artists,” Danly noted. The five-week residency allows for creative exploration and experimentation “in the crucible of artistic tradition that is Monhegan Island,” she said.

The Quimby Family Foundation grant will provide general operating support to expand MARC’s donor base and increase the level of donations of current supporters. Additional grants from the Underhill and Davis Family foundations have helped support the residency program, now in its 21st year.

Alina Gallo of Portland and Gail Hollenbeck of Bailey Island are the 2011 Monhegan Island artists in residence. Previous residents include Nicole Duennebier, Joe Kievitt, Sarah Knock, Marguerite Robichaux, Carol Sloane, Lynn Travis and David Vickery.

Since its founding in 1989, MARC has hosted 41 Maine artists on Monhegan Island. The program depends upon the financial support of individual donations and foundation grants. For information, visit www.monheganartistsresidency.org.

Christopher Keister Painting

Portland’s Aucocisco Galleries currently shows new work by Cassie Jones, Christopher Keister, Sage Lewis, and Mark Wethli – four artists at different points in their careers who are making very exciting art right now. Christopher Keister has abandoned painting the subtly configured, multi-colored circles on paper with which he made such a splash at the biennials of the Portland Museum of Art and the Center for Maine Contemporary Art and is now working representationally. I had seen the beginnings of his current body of work when I visited with him during his 2010 Monhegan Artists Residency. Keister is deeply fascinated by occultism, science fiction, psychedelics and drug culture and expresses this preoccupation through his work. The paintings at Aucocisco are small-scale depictions of the faces and busts of ancient statues, a human skull, a cut gem, and the word “Orgone,” an obscure theory concerning a universal life force. The straight, head-on representations against a simple, colored background turn these images into icons of a hermetic philosophy.

While Keister’s paintings are clearly representational, in some cases representations of representations, in spirit they are not as far removed from his earlier abstract work as it may seem. They present concepts and abstractions of hierarchical and mental power. Knowledge and understanding are given and denied at the same time – we know what we see, yet we don’t, leaving us wondering and uneasy, which I suspect the artist relishes evoking. It will be interesting to follow this young talent, who is driven by an earnest curiosity about new territories of the mind and the world beyond ours.

Sage Lewis has contributed a series of watercolors on sheets of propylene mounted on Plexi. Titled “Facet Studies,” central forms shaped like irregular gems float in white space. They are beautifully delicate, like whispers of blue liquid, layered and pooling along the edges. It is fascinating to observe how our mind latches onto any intimation of representation, craving the satisfaction of recognition. We will thus see lunar surfaces and wild seas in some of these images. But we should not be deceived for long and give them the attention they so richly deserve as entirely abstract works of art that engage material possibilities to exquisite effect.

Cassie Jones is represented with recent iterations of her wonderfully inventive, whimsical configurations of painted felt on wooden panels that she started in 2008. In these new works, too, there is a deliberate awkwardness that makes them strangely comforting and unsettling at the same time – seemingly soft and warm, and out-of-control fecund too.

In a group of smaller pieces to which “Come Across” belongs, organic, expanding masses are now more clearly defined against underlying, rectangular core shapes, the supporting panels. As in any formal juxtaposition of organic and abstract forms, Jones’ works could act as metaphors for the Cartesian model of body and mind continually wrestling for control, but that is merely an aside. Curiously, those safe geometric forms are the wildly patterned ones, and the bulging protuberances are the staid monochromes. The shapes of the latter have gained in complexity and decorativeness, lessening their alien character. Two visual languages interact, interrupting each other, speaking on two different planes, literally. Jones’ work cannot decide whether to be paintings or sculptures, and that is a great part of their attraction. Jones has a superbly creative mind and I cannot wait to see where she will be taking this “indecision” next.

Mark Wethli’s oeuvre has been marked by some radical changes, and in my opinion he is getting better and better with every move. Wethli contributed several small paintings on handmade paper to this show, many of which I find extremely exciting. They are the compositional twins of his paintings on re-purposed wood, yet they also mark significant departures. “Stay Tuned” and “Paper Thin” are black-on-white compositions of a meandering vertical line varying in width and shape but always remaining geometrical. Compared to the earlier paintings on wood, these have gained in interest for their subtly layered backgrounds in muted whites and greys of an underlying irregular grid that emerges and disappears. The figure/ground relationship is enriched and complicated and the geometric abstraction gains a handmade quality. To me they are simply beautiful, finely balanced works.

Other pieces are more colorful, even psychedelic, with maze-like forms, or more restrained, collage-like compositions of squares and rectangles. Of those, “Before I Knew You” stands out for its pastel tones and complex composition of uneven rectangles stacked up next to and on top of each other. Balances and relationships are just right, colors repeat and interact perfectly, and energy activates the entire surface – a love poem without much disguise. Wethli’s new work relates to his earlier grids and lines of color as well as the rigorously simplified paintings on panel, but a new playfulness is apparent that also speaks of mastery. Although small in scale, these are some of Wethli’s strongest works so far. All four artists are at their best at Aucocisco, producing engaging and exceptionally stimulating work. I highly recommend visiting the gallery for a very rewarding experience.

“Cassie Jones, Christopher Keister, Sage Lewis, and Mark Wethli” is on view through November 5 at Aucocisco Galleries, 89 Exchange Street, Portland, 775-2222; www.aucocisco.com.

Britta Konau can be reached at curatorbk@gmail.com or curatorbk.blogspot.com.