Ed Parker and Lyn Asselta open new shows at Gleason Fine Art

Beginning July 3, Southport artist Ed Parker and Damariscotta artist Lyn Asselta will open new shows at Gleason Fine Art in Boothbay Harbor. Both artists will be present at the opening reception from 5 to 7 p.m. July 5. The public is cordially invited to stop by the gallery, have a glass of wine, and chat with the artists.

Asselta’s show, “The Poetic Coast,” and Parker’s, “Painted Stories,” will both remain on view through July 29.

Lyn Asselta

Lyn Asselta is a gifted pastel artist. In addition to the many awards she has won, she has achieved the level of “master” in several prestigious pastel societies. Her immense talent is matched by her generosity and approachable nature — she shares her skills widely, teaching workshops across the country while preparing new work for at least two major shows each year. She divides her time between her home in Midcoast Maine and visits to Florida, where she spends time with her daughter and granddaughter and restocks her Florida gallery.

Asselta is also a talented writer and poet. Every Saturday, she publishes a new edition of Saturdays at the Cove, her reflections on life and art, always accompanied by one of her paintings. Like her artwork, her writing is sensitive and beautiful, never overly sentimental. Her many fans can look forward to a new book of her paintings and writings coming this fall.

Visitors encountering Asselta’s work for the first time often respond with silent awe or gasps of “how does she do it?” The answer lies in her rare combination of innate talent, extensive experience and acute sensitivity to her surroundings.

Ed Parker

Ed Parker is one of America’s leading marine painters. He and his wife live year-round on Southport Island. His paintings draw inspiration from 19th-century graphics, early American art, historical photographs and maritime traditions. Parker’s signature style blends Yankee sensibilities with wordplay, historical reverence, and a refined sense of design, proportion and color.

While Parker’s ships, ferries and canoes are meticulously rendered, his scenes often surprise: the decks teem with dogs, cats, roosters, cows, horses — even mermaids and sea serpents. In Parker’s oceans, whales always win.

For “Painted Stories,” Parker has delivered some of his finest work yet. Highlights include A Circus of Puffins, featuring seven puffins dressed in whimsical circus attire; A Squabble of Seagulls, with ten herring gulls loudly arguing; and Greenland Whale Fisheries, where a majestic schooner faces off against a pod of sperm whales, observed by polar bears and walruses.

Gleason Fine Art is at 31 Townsend Ave., Boothbay Harbor. Summer gallery hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday and noon to 5 p.m. Sunday. For more information, call Gleason Fine Art at 207-633-6849, email the gallery at info@gleasonfineart.com, or go to www.gleasonfineart.com.