Bobbi Heath Archives | Page 5 of 7

August 24, 2017

It all depends on where you’re coming from

The Jersey shore is hot, but I just remembered Big Boy tomatoes. Ah, bliss.

Beach Haven, by Carol L. Douglas

Yesterday was more comfortable than Tuesday. It was still in the mid-eighties, but the humidity was lower and there was a slight offshore breeze.

Bobbi and I perched in a pavilion on Pearl Avenue at Beach Haven. There’s an awesome orange water tower there, but no shade from which to paint it. We chose the beach for the pavilion.

We had considered getting a pedicure during the heat of the day, but decided that was irresponsible. Had we been working in Maine at these temperatures, we would have had ourselves declared dead and gone out for a wine spritzer. But we’re here to work, I kept reminding myself.

Periodically, guys ran down to the beach carrying a brace of brass bells. They rang them in long peals. I finally figured out that they were ice cream truck drivers, and that the bells were to advertise their wares. Business seemed slow to me.

“Usually, they rush over when I ring the bell, but it’s a little chilly today,” one of them said.

View from Joan’s rooftop aerie.

My favorite place to paint thus far has been on the roof of a three-story house. In the real world, this would be a two-story house, but it’s up on stilts to avoid being flooded out. The space below has a man cave, an open-air studio and two outside showers. We should have worked down there, but one glimpse of the rooftop and I was hooked.

If I started shortly after dawn, I could work up there until mid-morning. The roof deck is painted with a thick white waterproof enamel that feels like the surround of a municipal swimming pool. It’s comfortable until it heats up. After that, it’s suddenly too hot to stand. I had no shoes on, of course. When it got to that point, I hopped around trying to clean up and get off the roof as quickly as I could.

Ironically, the major furnishing of this beautiful aerie is a hot tub.

There are too many paintings up there to ignore. While I’m painting the view between two houses, Bobbi is painting a street in the opposite direction. There are entire lives to be glimpsed from the roof: furniture, cars, the beach groomers, utility guys, cleaning people. It’s quiet and aloof, considering the crowds elsewhere.

I love being up there above the trees. I am the Little King of Everything, surveying all that I see.

Commercial scallopers, by Carol L. Douglas

Our hostess is Joan Gantz, a talented abstract painter. She just finished a mammoth mosaic mural project that has taken three seasons to complete. I don’t think I’ve ever been billeted in an artist’s house before. It’s been fun to talk art with her, and her studio makes a great place to stash our incomplete paintings.

New Jersey is the Garden State in part because it’s so hot. Joan reminded me about New Jersey tomatoes. I wonder if I can find room for an eight-quart basket of Big Boys in our already-overfilled car.

August 23, 2017

Why sell your work?

Selling is not selling out. If nothing else, you can use the money to buy more paint.

Keuka Lake, by Carol L. Douglas. All that vert is beautiful, but tough on allergies.

There is a myth that the word Genesee is Seneca for “Pleasant Valley.” In fact, it means “miasma,” from the humid air that hangs over the Genesee Valley. The Seneca were the most numerous of the Haudenosaunee people. Many moved west along the Niagara River and south into Pennsylvania. This was largely to escape the heavy air in their heartland.

The Adirondacks were never permanently settled by the Iroquois and Algonquin. They hunted there and brawled with each other. The winters are too cold, the summers are rainy, and the soil is thin.

I haven’t had an asthma attack since I left New York. Rochester is a city of lovely gardens, which means heavy pollen. I loved to garden; I hated my allergies. In Maine, nobody fusses with rare plants, and the offshore breezes keep the pollen down. I replace my rescue inhaler annually but never need it.

Letchworth Middle and Upper Falls, by Carol L. Douglas.

Last week in the Adirondacks I was having twinges of breathing trouble. It was nothing that I couldn’t control by sitting quietly. When I arrived at Long Beach Island, NJ, my asthma bloomed with terrific ferocity.

“Welcome to New Jersey,” my New Jersey pal Toby texted me when I complained. I blamed the cedars and retreated to air conditioning.

With temperatures in the mid-eighties and no shade, both Bobbi Heath and I were wilting. A few passers-by expressed amazement that we were painting here instead of at home in cool, breezy Maine. Why would we do that, they asked. We’re here to sell paintings.

Bridle path, by Carol L. Douglas

Sometimes I meet people at plein air events who say they do these events just to have fun. I’m not sure if I believe them. These festivals are organized around the all-important show and sale at the end. The energy is infectious.

Selling your work is important. When people pay money for your work, they’re telling you that it’s good enough to shell out for. That’s far better validation than your grandmother’s praise.

Selling is communication, a dialogue between you and the buyer. Putting your work out with a price tag forces you to see it as transactional, as a reciprocal exchange of ideas. That, in turn, requires that you clarify your ideas enough for them to make sense to the viewer. Some people call that ‘selling out,’ but I’m not talking about producing dreck. I’m talking about the difference between omphaloskepsis and conversation.

Eastern Manitoba forest, by Carol L. Douglas. I love trees but they don’t always like me.

Selling your work grows your fan base, because it puts your work out there for public consideration. And therein lies the rub. When you first start out, the work you labored over will probably be met with cruel indifference. You just need to work through that.

I first started selling paintings because the finished ones were taking up too much room. And, of course, most of us also need the money, if only to buy more paint.

According to Toby, today is going to be cooler. We’ve got paintings to make and a schedule to keep. I sure hope she’s right.

August 22, 2017

Self-defeating behavior?

Perhaps women make less money because we tend to take our careers less seriously than men do.

American Eagle in Dry Dock, by Carol L. Douglas

I’ve written about gender inequality in prices achieved by male and female artists. I’ve also writtenabout the gender gap in the broader arts industry. Women in the arts earn 68¢ for every dollar earned by men. That’s far worse than in the overall economy, where women can expect to earn 79¢ for every male-earned dollar.

There’s gender disparity in arts prizes, too. We see it at every awards celebration. It’s somewhat puzzling because the judging for art prizes is usually ‘blind’, meaning the juror doesn’t know who the artist is. However, that’s a leaky bucket, since most of us recognize each other’s work even when the work isn’t signed.

Dinghy, Camden Harbor, by Carol L. Douglas

If work is genuinely judged without knowledge of who the artist is, what do judges see in men’s work that they don’t in women’s work? Men tend to paint bigger at plein airevents; they buy into the cliché, “go big or go home” more than women do. Bigger work is flashier and more likely to catch a juror’s eye. That’s about the only qualitative gender-based difference I’ve seen, and it’s hardly absolute. I’ve strained to look for them, and differences in subject matter, competence, temperament or viewpoint are simply not there.

Lisa BurgerLentz and I were chatting last week about the idea of professionalism. She proposed that artists who define themselves as professionals tend to earn more money than those who see themselves as dedicated hobbyists or amateurs. I looked around the sales floor at Adirondack Plein Air and thought she was right. Those painters who see themselves as pros charge more money and put effort into creating a consistent package of framing, image, and product. They have developed a sales patter that works. To be a professional artist, you do a lot more than create beautiful work.

Bev’s Garden, by Carol L. Douglas

Bobbi Heath and I drove to Long Island Beach, New Jersey, yesterday for Plein Air Plus. In her prior life, Bobbi was a tech project manager who worked in entrepreneurial start-ups. She brings those management skills to her art career. “No one else bestows on you the title of ‘professional.’ You decide whether you’re a professional or not. It’s not about how much you sell. It is based on your view of yourself. Being a professional is about how you approach your work. It’s an attitude that you have about yourself and your career.”

None of this has anything to do with artistic brilliance. I assume that anyone reading this is already striving to be the best painter he or she can be. In the marketplace, artistic brilliance is a chimera. It’s irrelevant to sales, because there’s a market for anything. It’s also a subjective definition.

Keuka Clearing Sky, by Carol L. Douglas

Perhaps women make less money because we tend to take our careers less seriously than men do. We shy away from the hard work of comparative pricing, marketing, and market development, partially because those aren’t areas we have any experience in. We tend to see our low income as an indictment of our worth, rather than a stage in our business development. If that’s the case, we’re shooting ourselves in the foot.

August 1, 2017

Support the Center for Maine Coastal Fisheries

It’s time for Stonington’s nautical auction again, but this year the selection has gone wild.

Two Boat Rock, Jill Hoy

Regular readers know that I’ve supported the Maine Center for Coastal Fisheries since before I moved to coastal Maine. A viable fisheries industry is crucial to Maine’s economy, but it also is the bedrock on which our tourism rests.

In past years, the Nautical Auction featured painted buoys. I enjoyed doing them, but I’m not a craftsperson. When they expanded their auction to include non-buoy items, I jumped at the chance to submit a conventional framed canvas. This year’s submission was painted off the deck of American Eagle last summer, and is of Scott Island off Stonington.

Fish, Peter Beerits

I like to leaf through the items on offer. This year the catalog includes more than 80 items across a wide range of categories, only tangentially related to buoys. There are gift certificates for seafood, and there’s pretty jewelry. You can get a one-year membership to the Farnsworth Museum. If that’s a little too arty for you, bid on a 3.3 HP Mercury Outboard Motor instead.

Andrew Gove’s, Bobbi Heath

There are B&B stays, personal boat tours and a sea-kayaking eco-tour. There’s a sail on the ketch Guildive out of Castine, or if you already work on the water, a gift certificate toward your boat’s lettering or a certificate for haul out or put in.

Cod Fishing, Siri Beckman

One lucky winner will see his or her name in Katherine Hall Page’s next mystery. There are antique, contemporary and cookbooks on offer, and an Opinel fishing knife.

Scott Island, High Tide, Carol L. Douglas

And of course, there’s art and a selection of buoys as well. But don’t take my word for it: the whole crazy array can be viewed here. The proceeds of the sale go to support sustainable, human-scale fisheries on the Maine coast.

Two Daughters Papercut, Larry Moffet

The bad news, for me, is the timing: the auction is Monday, August 7, at Opera House Arts. The preview starts at 5:30 and the bidding starts at six. I’ll be at Acadia National Park teaching my annual workshop.

However, we can also place silent bids by emailing Bobbi Billings or phoning the office at 207-367-2708. Bids will be accepted until August 4.

July 14, 2017

Friday flotsam and jetsam

What’s a studio visit all about? And how do you prep for it while prepping to go on the road?

Outrunning the Storm, 30X48, is finished and awaiting delivery to Camden Falls Gallery.

Bobbi Heath is co-hosting Leslie Saeta’s Artists Helping Artists this month. They discussed this blog yesterday in the segment called What We Can Learn From the Top Rated Artist’s Blogs.

Thank you! Artists Helping Artists is the top-rated art show on blogtalk radio.

Bobbi will be recording the next one during the middle of Castine Plein Air. That will be a tough balancing act, since she’s also a participating artist.

My host for Castine texted me yesterday. She’s in New Jersey and wanted me to know that it was 95° F. there and 59° in Castine. That’s perfect painting weather.

We don’t have or need air conditioning here in coastal Maine. The air off the North Atlantic keeps us comfortable. The average high temperature here is 76° in July and 75° in August. Bear that in mind if you’re thinking about my workshop in August.

I’m packing for next week’s events. Yesterday, I got a text from another painter. “I’m bringing 14 frames to Castine,” she told me. “I have four that are a different molding than the others. I want to try them out. And most of them are already wired so they aren’t extra work. And I have seven sizes, mostly in pairs. Am I nuts?”

This is what’s on my easel. It’s based on a pre-dawn sail out of Camden last summer.

That’s a lot of frame for the six paintings she’s limited to, but her car is big enough. I always carry a variety of frames, so I can choose finishes and sizes depending on what I end up finishing.

I’m expecting a studio visit when I get home next weekend. Before I leave, my studio needs to be prepped. I keep regular open hours so it’s always presentable, but there are special considerations for a gallerist’s visit.

Although my studio isn’t vast, it is first and foremost a workshop. What I’m working on right now is part of my story. I don’t clear it away unless it’s unusually fragile.

There are many reasons for a gallerist or collector to visit us: to select work for a show, to see new work, or just to get to know us better. The same rules of hospitality that you apply in your house are appropriate in your studio. Turn off the stereo, ignore your phone and offer your guests refreshment.

Spring at the Boatyard will be going soon as well, en route to the Rye Art Center in Rye, NY.

Some experts recommend preparing a presentation on your work and its evolution. I have a strong internet presence, so I think that’s overkill. If I didn’t, a binder with earlier work, postcards and clippings would be appropriate.

If a person is interested in earlier work, I can pull out representative samples from storage. But most people are not interested in my past, but what I’m painting now.

Ready for visitors: neat, clean but not stripped of my work.

My studio functions as a gallery during the summer months, so there’s already a small selection of work hanging. However, the studio visit isn’t primarily to ‘sell’ art; it’s really to get to know the artist better. Think of it as a professional visit between two peers.

What do we talk about? The work, mostly: where it was done, what it means to me, and where I’m going with the ideas. Artists tend to be shy about this kind of interaction, especially when nervous. It helps me to remember that I don’t need to “sell” myself; the visit itself indicates a genuine interest in my work.

However, you don’t need to fill dead air space either. Give your visitor a chance to really look at your art.

June 30, 2017

Niggling

The things that fizz at the corners of our consciousness are distracting. That’s why I share them with you.

Historic Fort Point, by Carol L. Douglas, painted for Wet Paint on the Weskeag.

Earlier this week, I pondered why artists embrace so much hard work for so little return. This question has niggled at me. As I was careening up the twisting streets of Boothbay Harbor to this week’s destination, I decided that artists are like movie starlets. We need to be at the soda fountain if we’re going to be discovered.

I know one actual starlet, Keren Coghill. As far as I can see, Keren doesn’t spend much time sitting, at the soda fountain or anywhere else. She’s either working, working out or answering audition calls. That’s of course true of successful visual artists as well.

There are no guarantees. We apply to shows or galleries that ought to be slam-dunks, but are rejected. Others are impossibly beyond our reach; inexplicably, they accept us. This isn’t fate. It’s a numbers game. The more places you apply, the more you’ll be accepted. The more shows you do, the more you’ll be seen. The more you’re seen, the more people will buy your work.

Rachel Carson sunset, by Carol L. Douglas, painted for Ocean Park Plein Air.

My relationship with the Kelpie Gallery started with an event I decided to do at the last minute, Wet Paint on the Weskeag. I had 48 hours between the end of my Sea & Sky workshopand a flight to Scotland. Why not plug one more event into that already absurd schedule? Tired and with no expectation of success, I painted well and won the Juror’s Choice Award.

The Kelpie Galleryis holding an artist reception tonight for Summertide at The Kelpie, from 5-7 PM. If you haven’t visited this gallery, it’s a treasure. Owner Susan Baineskeeps her stable of artists to a manageable number. The space is light, airy, and well-utilized. It’s at 81 Elm Street in South Thomaston, just down the road from the Owls Head Transportation Museum. Since I’m now one of Sue’s artists, I’ll be there.

Jonathan Submarining, by Carol L. Douglas, painted for Castine Plein Air.

Until then, I’ll be in my studio, trying to figure out if a painting is finished. Some artists love these last brush strokes; I do not. An engineer friend once told me that in most projects, 90% of the effort goes into 10% of the results.

Or, as Tom Cargill of Bell Labs said, “The first 90 percent of the code accounts for the first 90 percent of the development time. The remaining 10 percent of the code accounts for the other 90 percent of the development time.”

I generally like to buy self-help books and put them on my shelf unread, the idea being that I’ll get the message through my credit card statement. It’s better when someone else reads them and tells me the precis.

Boston Post Road Bridge, Mamaroneck, by Carol L. Douglas, painted for Rye Painters on Location.

Bobbi Heath is reading Growing Gills by Jessica Abel. She posits that undone creative ideas are corrosive. They sit in the back of your mind and niggle at you, making you anxious and unproductive.

That is what I think about undone housework and unpaid bills. Are unfinished paintings the same? My studio is full of them. Like most artists, I find finishing work to be the hardest part of painting.

I used to be a font of crackpot ideas, but I’ve noticed that the harder I work, the less I experience off-task mental fizzing. That’s partly because my brain isn’t bored. It’s partly because working at set times trains our minds to concentrate. Whatever the mechanism, it’s a blessed relief.

June 29, 2017

Slightly sloshy artist gets soaked

The only thing you can predict with certainty about this summer’s weather is that it will rain.

Just slightly soaked, I try again. Photo courtesy of Annette Koziel

Fishermen’s Memorial Park sits above the lobster fleet in Boothbay Harbor. It’s a sobering memorial; the list of lives lost at sea is long and a fresh wreath hangs on its bronze dory. Behind the park rises the uncompromising white frame spire of Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church, celebrating its centenary this year. Its vaulted ceiling is reminiscent of the ribs of the Ernestina-Morrisey, currently laid open in Boothbay’s shipyard. On the hour, Our Lady’s carillon peals earnest hymns across the water.

Our Lady of Peace Catholic Church.

Bobbi Heath, Ed Buonvecchio and I were meeting to demo for Windjammer Days. We’d planned to grab lunch in town and then paint at the Fire Hall, where a tent was set up for our convenience. However, we’re landscape painters. The best view of all was from the park and the church.

Clearly, everyone else thought so too. The place was mobbed. Late in the morning, one of my students, Jennifer Johnson, stopped by. We were just coming to grips with the idea that we couldn’t leave to get something to eat. Jennifer kindly volunteered to fetch our lunches. The restaurant was closed, so she brought us fresh vegetarian chili made with her own two hands. That, friends, is ‘supporting the arts.’

American Eagle, a tug, and an antique launch… clearly the best view in town.

“It’s going to be a great day,” Jennifer promised me. “No rain on the forecast.” Radar agreed with her. Large fluffy clouds marched in from the west. Our displays of work were set up, we were surrounded by interested people asking intelligent questions, and below us paraded a motley collection of fantastic winged angels, the windjammers for which the festival is named.

A young lad named Ben positioned himself next to me, trying to name the boats as they came in. “It’s just like identifying cars,” I told him. “You figure out the model from its shape and its details. Does it have a topsail? A bowsprit? A racing stripe?”

My sketch. The tide was on the turn, so the boats were swinging.

He was fascinated by the privateer Lynx. It’s an interpretation of an historic privateer built in 1812 to run British naval blockades. Its masts are severely raked, meaning they tilt. This term gives us the modern word rakish.

The boats and their adoring fans moved on. Ropy fingers of moisture started to spill down from the friendly cumulus clouds. “It’s raining there, there, and there,” I said to Ed and Bobbi. We’d barely repacked our gallery when the skies let loose.

Rain, again.

Annette Koziel, a friend and fan from Brunswick, arrived with the rain. She had a tarp in her car. We tossed it over my easel and ran for Bobbi’s car. Artists know that if Nature throws a passing shower, you use the break to find a bathroom.

At the Lobster Dock.

It stopped as quickly as it started. I mopped up and tried again. I picked up my brush and a second shower poured down. I can take a hint, I thought.

Lobster boats at Boothbay (unfinished) by Carol L. Douglas

I had an errand to run in Brunswick, so I headed south, taking me across the giant parking lot that is the Wiscasset bridge. Generally, I do sums in my head when I need to stay alert while driving, but Annette gave me a great tip. A small radio station broadcasts quirky, mid-century standards from an old tidal mill in West Bath. If you’re traveling up Route 1, try tuning your radio to 98.3.

Later, I heard from Jennifer. She was so sure it wouldn’t rain that she left her windows open while she ran in the grocery store. Now, that’s adventurous.

June 13, 2017

You call this working?

For me, serious illness was a corrective to the impulse to tiptoe around my calling. It reminded me that time is precious and fleeting.

As I tried to figure out how my carefully-planned day went so haywire, a friend pointed out, “you hate packing and you love boats.” That is the only explanation for giving up what I absolutely had to do in order to join Howard Gallagher and Ken DeWaard on the Dirty Dory.

Camden is full of beautiful boats. It’s easy enough to find opportunities to paint them at rest. It’s much more difficult to see them under sail. I have a few photos from last year’s trip on American Eagle. Two years ago, Howard took the late Lee Boynton and me out to see the start of the Eggemoggin Reach Regatta. We shot pictures of modern boats. But opportunities to shoot the massive old schooners under way are limited, and I should grab them when I can.

Mercantile raising her sails.

It takes a skilled navigator to get in position while not annoying the schooner crew, and Howard is that. Here’s the video he shot while we were out:

One of the boats we followed out was the ketch Angelique. She is distinctive for her brown-rose tan-barked sails. In 2016, Poppy Balser and I sketched her as she stood off Castine in a harbor that already hosted Bowdoinand J&E Riggin. It was a magical morning but eventually I finished and left. Poppy stayed; Angelique docked; Poppy scored. Timing, as they say, is everything.

Angelique at the Dock, watercolor, by Poppy Balser.

The same was true yesterday. I returned to my studio to frame and photograph paintings and clean and pack my car. Ed Buonvecchio called; we chatted about the recent Finger Lakes Plein Air Festival. Kari Ganoung Ruiz, who won Best in Show, is a friend and a fellow member of Greater Rochester Plein Air Painters. She was my monitor for my 2015 Sea and Sky workshop. Kudos to a fine, fine painter.

Ed and I are heading to Nova Scotia this afternoon to paint in the Parrsboro International Plein Air Festival. I was there earlier this year with Bobbi Heath. The landscape is spectacular and I’m expecting great things to happen.

Angelique leaving Camden harbor.

This three-day event is full of meet-and-greet events, more than this old recluse is accustomed to. The culmination is a Collector’s Gala on Saturday night. I’m a little anxious at its posh description. Oh, well. One bright side to owning only one dress is that one doesn’t need to dither about what to wear. No, I’m not packed, but in the end, will anyone remember what I wore?

My husband says that after my first bout with cancer, I quit doing things I didn’t want to do. That’s not entirely true; every life is full of mundane and humdrum chores like packing. What has changed is that I try to not let obligation stand in the way of opportunity. Serious illness is a great corrective to the human impulse to tiptoe around our true calling. It reminds us that time is precious and fleeting.

June 9, 2017

The one thing you shouldn’t say to another artist

I hate the word “mindfulness,” but I’ve resolved to be mindful about offering unsolicited advice to my peers.

The Three Graces, available through Camden Falls Gallery. My to-do list includes painting more boats in the water.

I’m just smart enough to know when to ask other people for advice. It’s usually very helpful, and I have many friends I also consider to be mentors. Then there’s unsolicited advice. I’ve come to dread the phrase “you should…” It always means another project I don’t have time to finish.

That’s pretty ironic coming from someone who teaches. Much of my time is spent saying “you should…” to my students. I can justify that by saying that my students sought my help. But I’m starting to think that “you should…” is the least helpful and most corrosive way of framing ideas.

Dawson City, Yukon. My undone list also includes finding a venue for the paintings from my Trans-Canada trip.

“You should…” isn’t an offer of help. It often ignores the realities or ideas that prevent someone from doing what the speaker thinks needs doing.

“I already know I’m failing on a daily basis, because of the things I don’t get done,” an artist friend said recently. “I don’t need any help seeing that.”

Most professional artists are one-man shows. We do our own marketing, publicity, office work, and cleaning. Non-artists would be shocked at the number of hours we work, especially when our work seems to progress slowly.

I should put my remaining urban paintings on sale on the internet, since they’re unlikely to sell in a gallery here on the Maine coast.

I use Bobbi Heath’sorganizational system, here, to manage my work flow. Bobbi was a successful project manager in the corporate world. Her system is similar in concept to that which my husband’s software development team uses, although they don’t have cute Post-it notes. My calendar is computerized, as is my bookkeeping.

In other words, I’m as organized as I ever will be, and I still can’t get everything done. In fact, I have a standing to-do list that’s far longer than the working hours in my week. When I add another task to it, something else has to come out.

A great frame in its place, but its place isn’t here.

One of the big “you should…” tasks on my list is changing my frame style. What worked in New York is too heavy and formal for Maine.

I have a plan for a stunning, light floater frame, drawn for me by artist Ed Buonvecchio. A friend showed me another frame, with a wood liner, that is equally airy. I have the woodshop in which to build either style. What I don’t have is the time to do the work. So I ordered a different gold frame for the 2017 season, and my real update will have to wait another year.

There’s a lesson in this for me. I hate the word “mindfulness,” but I’ve resolved to be mindful about saying “you should…” to my peers. Is there a better way to express the idea? Should the idea be left unspoken? Does this person want my input, or would simply listening be more helpful?

June 5, 2017

New name, same vision

Penobscot East Resource Center has changed its name to Maine Center for Coastal Fisheries. It’s still the same great group.

High Tide, Scott Island, by Carol L. Douglas

Artists are besieged by requests for auction items. I’ve written before about how you should contribute if you support the organization’s goals, but not because you think it will give you a tax deduction.

One organization I endorse is the Maine Center for Coastal Fisheries (MCCF) in Stonington. This non-profit is dedicated to maintaining sustainable fishing off the Maine coast forever. They think this should be a three-pronged approach:

· Preserve our diverse ecosystem;
· Assure continued access to fishing;
· Maintain profitability for community-scale fishermen.

Much of the charm of the Maine coast comes from the fishing industry: the lobster fleets bobbing merrily in small harbors and coves, colorful traps stacked on wharves or fashioned into Christmas trees in the holiday season.

Stonington Green, by Bobbi Heath

The tourist industry is closely entwined with the fishing industry. So is the landscape-painting industry. That’s especially true for people like me, who paint a lot of boats.

For that reason, I’ve contributed painted buoys to MCCF’s auction for several years. My personal favorites were the Mermaid Madonna and the Lobster That Ate New York, although the lupineand fishones probably netted the group more money.

Stonington Public Landing, by Carol L. Douglas (courtesy the Kelpie Gallery)

Last year, Bobbi Heathjoined me in contributing a buoy. This year, we’re both contributing again. Happily, the organization has opened the auction up to include conventional paintings. I found painting on a cylinder to be devilishly difficult.

On Friday, I delivered a painting done off Stonington, entitled High Tide, Scott Island. I did this off the deck of American Eagle last summer. It was an idyllic day, and I hope my happiness at being on the water is apparent.

I also delivered Bobbi’s painting, Stonington Green. Administrative Director Bobbi Billings recognized the house as belonging to someone she knew. That kind of validation always tickles me, and I wish Bobbi Heath had been there to hear it.

The auction will be held on August 7 at the Opera House in Stonington. For more information, contact MCCF here.

Stonington waterfront (unfinished) by Carol L. Douglas

Friday was one of those days where every curve in the road elicits a gasp of delight at the wonder and glory of spring. Stonington is absurdly beautiful, but it’s also two hours from my studio. I’m lucky to get up there once or twice a summer. That has a bad effect on painting, because the pressure to choose the ‘right’ scene is immense.

I set up on the deck of MCCF’s office. It provides an iconic view of Stonington, with its repeating mansard roofs. I gave myself a strict deadline, after which I would have to be on my way. There’s a lot of drawing in the painting, and I have to adjust a roofline, but I very nearly made it.

Friday’s rainbow off Lincolnville.

I finished in complete solitude in the limpid light of late afternoon, the tide having filled the basin that lies before the town. In the distance, I could hear a foghorn bleating. The Maine coast produces erratic weather and distorts sound, so I had no idea where it might be raining. I packed my gear and reluctantly headed west. I wasn’t much past Orland when this Spring’s ever-present rain hit my windshield in earnest.