Missing Painting Maine during a Pandemic

      Joe and I were invited to join our children in Bar Harbor ME mid-August, a spot which has not seen a lot of the virus. Of course we are staying home, but it is a sign of the time that Massachusetts people really are not wanted in ME since MA virus numbers are not good enough. NYC numbers work! But I started looking through my old photos of painting getaways in ME since I am going to the studio soon.   

      A favorite trip of mine is to attend a painting workshop at Rock Garden Inn, Sebasco Estates, Maine. I have driven up to attend workshops for oil and watercolor painting landscapes and portrait painting.You live in little cottages on a point surrounded by water with many amenities, the best being the fabulous evening meals. You get a breakfast in the morn, a takeaway lunch for your painting adventure and return for gourmet dining in the evening after an energetic day wielding a brush with colors in the out of doors.  We venture out to rocks near the water, docks and cottages, to gardens and beaches. Should rain happen, there is an indoor studio.

 

       

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    Teacher Don Nice would work on watercolor that would remind me a bit of John Marin's modern Maine watercolors. Then he would go further, tearing or cutting the old paintings to shape new pictures in collage. I did better in the oil and acrylic portrait and landscape weeks. Watercolor has always challenged me!

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       We would paint one or two or three paintings a day and I had many canvases and tablets to show the effort. I found some photos of my studio before the fire and down almost at the bottom of the white shelves you can see lineups of canvas and cardboard of my enriching summer get-a-ways.