This summer, the Monhegan Museum of Art & History will celebrate the life and art of painter James Fitzgerald (1899-1971) in a retrospective of his watercolor and oil paintings. “The Odyssey of James Fitzgerald” will be on view July 1 through Sept. 30.
“The Odyssey of James Fitzgerald” will explore Fitzgerald’s early sketches as a student at the Massachusetts College of Art and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and paintings from his time in Monterey, California, where he was part of a community of artists and writers known as the Cannery Row circle. A special focus will be paid to Fitzgerald’s paintings of Monhegan Island, where he visited several times in the 1920s and 1930s before making the island his permanent residence. With the help of his good friends and patrons, Anne and Edgar Hubert, he purchased a home and studio built by Rockwell Kent — buildings that are now part of the Monhegan Museum.
Fitzgerald’s Monhegan paintings were informed by his close observation of the place and the people and by his interest in Asian art and philosophy, which he first encountered in California. Paintings of Fitzgerald’s annual trips to Maine’s Mount Katahdin and from his visits to the Aran Islands in Ireland explore his lifelong interest in the power of nature and man’s relationship to the sea.
“James Fitzgerald developed a lifelong commitment to the ever-elusive quest of capturing the universal in the particular,” said Dan Broeckelmann, chair of James Fitzgerald Legacy. “A master of composition and simplification of form, with subjects ranging from the mundane to the majestic, Fitzgerald’s body of work continues to offer great beauty, freshness and originality.”
The Monhegan Museum of Art & History is open daily from June 24 through Sept. 30, during which time the Kent/Fitzgerald Home and Studio are open three days a week and by appointment. For more information, visit www.monheganmuseum.org.
Harbor Square Gallery in Camden is showing new work by Thomas O’Donovan, the jeweler and artistic director who founded the gallery more than four decades ago. On view is “Revelation,” from his series The Offering, crafted in 18k gold and bronze with antique coconut heishi beads. Harbor Square Gallery is at 37 Bay View St., […]
The Deer Isle Artists Association gallery welcomes North Carolina-based painter Tony Griffin as artist-in-residence for April. Griffin’s work — deeply rooted in the tradition of the Renaissance masters — spans portraiture, figure painting and plein air landscape. He studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia and has exhibited throughout North Carolina […]
Waterfall Arts in Belfast opens “Make Your Mark,” an immersive, community-driven exhibition transforming the Clifford Gallery into an interactive space inspired by street art, April 18 through May 29. An opening reception is April 18 from 1 to 3 p.m. and is free and open to the public. The exhibition features participatory installations including doodle […]
Local Color Gallery in Belfast welcomes fiber artist Sarah Leighton as guest artist April 21 through May 17. Leighton will speak about her work during Fourth Friday Gallery Night on April 25 from 4 to 7 p.m., with her talk beginning at 5 p.m. Leighton grew up in Midcoast Maine, where her French-Canadian grandmother — […]
The Union of Maine Visual Artists presents “Bodies in Motion,” an exhibition of work in various media at Zoot Coffee in Camden, running April 1 through 30. The show features 19 artists: Hillary Steinau, Cynthia Motian McGuirl, Jess Lauren Lipton, Charlie Newton, Maryjean Viano Crowe, Mackenzie Martin, Jorge Pena, Rachel Robbins, Shanna McNair, Kristi Marsh, […]
Three artists are currently featured at Dowling Walsh Gallery in Rockland, spanning painting, assemblage and works on paper. Robert Hamilton (1917-2004) thought of his paintings as “a place for something to occur — little pictorial events, little plays.” In “Come Back Sweet Mama (Boy in Museum)” (1990), the avid recreational tennis player imagined a museum […]
Maine Art Gallery in Wiscasset has shaped its 2026 exhibition season around the ways artists respond to the natural world and Maine’s place in the sustainable agriculture movement. The season opens with “Art to Table: Visual Sustenance,” a juried show examining individual and communal relationships to food through works that elevate ingredients, meals and rituals. […]
Meetinghouse Arts kicked off the season with a creative conversation featuring artist Charlie Hewitt on March 18, partnering with Freeport Community Services for the evening event. Hewitt is known for his Hopeful Project, a glowing installation originally commissioned by Speedwell in 2019 that has since spread to dozens of sites. The gallery also hosted a […]
George Marshall Store Gallery in York opened “Block Party!” on March 15, bringing together artists living, working or with ties to York, Kittery, Eliot, South Berwick, Ogunquit and Wells. The open-call exhibition featured a wide variety of mediums, experimental approaches and interpretations of local landmarks. The show included work by Karen Adrienne, Marena Bach, Todd […]
Receive news and information about Maine artists and events delivered right to your inbox.
