Two members of the Pemaquid Gallery of Artists, Paul Sherman and Sarah Fisher, have constructed their training over the years, working with teachers and mentors, and have been inspired by the art around them. Both are Damariscotta residents.
Sherman has pursued art for most of his life, and has also been self-employed in many technical fields, starting out with a masters in technical engineering. His often surreal and colorful, patterned but realistic watercolors may reflect this technical background, and he seems to have settled on an almost graphic but brilliantly fluid style.
Fisher started focusing on art after retiring to Damariscotta 10 years ago but as an adult always sketched and painted in her spare time. Her 45-year career as a fine art museum painting conservator kept her close to great artwork and constantly using her hand skills. She began painting as a watercolorist but is showing several oils this season. She has found painting in oil very satisfying, slowly developing a more abstract, expressionistic style.
Sherman’s subject matter ranges from boats, buoys, pets and people to still lifes. Depictions of water often link his subjects together. Light fills his work, and his colors are limited and brilliant. His fascination with light, reflections and waves creates calligraphic, flowing shapes and patterns that look as if very realistic images had been broken down into interlocking patterns. A black outline of varying widths often emphasizes these patterns and creates increased abstraction, as do his strong, off-center compositions. Sherman, a studio painter, is also a musician, which suggests there may be a musical link in the flowing patterns of his images. His work can be seen at Lincolnville Fine Art Gallery and online at artbypaulsherman.blogspot.com.
Fisher has focused most recently on the local views that she sees in her daily walks and finds that the shapes of buildings become especially crisp, clear and evocative in the Maine winter light. The shapes can interact with each other in fluid and angular ways on the canvas and inspire her to express that visually. In the winter, she works in the studio, and in the summer, she devotes her time mostly to plein-air painting along the coast, usually completed in the studio, often using the immediacy and unexpected effects of watercolor to achieve the spontaneity of the natural world and its beauty.
The other 2022 exhibiting members of the Pemaquid Group of Artists are Barbara Applegate, Debra Arter, Bruce Babb, Julie Babb, Stephen Busch, John Butke, Dianne Dolan, Gwendolyn Evans, Peggy Farrell, Claire Hancock, Kay Sawyer Hannah, Kathleen Horst, Hannah Ineson, Will Kefauver, Jan Kilburn, Barbara Klein, Patti Leavitt, Sally Loughridge, Judy Nixon, Alexandra Perry-Weiss, Belva Ann Prycel, Marnie Sinclair, Gary Smith, Cindy Spencer, Liliana Thelander, Kim Skillen Traina, Barbara Vanderbilt, Bob Vaughan, Candace Vlcek and Sherrie York.
Categories: Damariscotta, Pemaquid Point
