“Installing an exhibition is a bit like moving into a new house,” says Portland Museum of Art (PMA) chief curator Shalini Le Gall. There’s plenty of advance planning, but equally important are the unexpected, in-the-moment decisions that happen in the … Continue reading →

“We’re seeing things now, we’re telling powerful stories now, and you would benefit by engaging with them.” —Mali Obomsawin, from a 2022 interview with Vermont Public Radio New meaning and understanding emerge everywhere in Exploding Native Inevitable: An Exhibition of … Continue reading →

As winter sets in and the days grow darker, I am reminded of the time in ancient Greece when caves symbolized the entrance to the classical underworld. A person entered the cave to seek wisdom in the darkness not the … Continue reading →

On an exposed granite ledge overlooking Perkins Cove perches the Ogunquit Museum of American Art (OMAA). Southern Maine’s modernist gem of whitewashed cinderblock, stone lintels, repurposed wood ceiling beams, and glass is celebrating 70 years with a number of concurrent … Continue reading →

The first time Robert McCloskey (1914–2003) explored the possibility of creating children’s books, he had the great fortune of being rejected by May Massee. Massee, an editor at Viking Press at the time, essentially told McCloskey, “Come back when you’ve … Continue reading →

I remember visiting the studio of an old man who painted nothing but the sea,” Reuben Tam (1916–1991) wrote of a trip to Monhegan Island in an undated note now collected in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art. “I thought … Continue reading →

When the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Madison opened its doors in 1946, the founders contacted schools around the country to recruit the best young art students to this unique new summer residency. The Cooper Union in New … Continue reading →

70 Main — Thomaston Within the town of Thomaston, several large green spaces provide a sense of freshness along Route 1. Between the closely spaced blocks of the town a visitor can catch glimpses of their surprising breadth. Situated in one … Continue reading →

When Winslow Myers was a senior at Philips Exeter Academy, he made a clay portrait bust of Ernest Hemingway. A cast was poured with “molten linotype metal” repurposed from the local community newspaper, and the resulting sculpture was juried into … Continue reading →