From the Mountains to the Sea: An Island Artist Residency

I'll be going away from home for about two weeks in August, having been granted an Artist Residency at the Shoals Marine Lab on Appledore Island, Maine. I am very excited to be immerse in a completely different environment than the White Mountains that I am used to, though a little apprehensive of what I will find there to inspire paintings, drawings and sketches. I do know that there is plenty of rocky shoreline, and being solidly on "Team Rocks," this is very reasurring.

I come from a long line of non-sea people. My mother's side of the family goes back generations on Long Island, though they were mostly farmers or had other occupations not connected with the ocean. On my dad's side, they stuck around the Connecticut River Valley, far from salt water. My husband's family, on the other hand, has branches that stretch back into old Cape Cod, with a sprinkling of sea captains. He grew up going there in the summer, sailing and eating bivalves and crustaceans. I'd never had a raw oyster or been on a sailboat until I started going there with him in my late twenties. The ocean was, frankly, a little weird and scary to me.

However, over the years I've fallen in love with tide pools, come to enjoy a lot more types of seafood, and gained a healthy respect for the sea. I've painted a few shoreline views, standing on the sand with my easel and broad-brimmed hat. The changing light and colors of the water in every kind of weather are fascinating. The shore birds are mesmerizing. And kayaking through a salt marsh is pretty awesome.

So, when the residency applications opened up for Shoals Marine Lab this spring, I went ahead and applied, not thinking I had much of a shot as a mountain painter. When the notification date passed by without any news I chalked it up to their getting lots of competitive applications and figured I'd try again next year. But not long after I got a call asking if I wanted a spot as one artist had dropped out. Absolutely! Count me in.

And here I go. Two weeks on the island, painting, interacting with student groups working through marine science classes, exploring every part of this tiny but complex landscape, and hopefully coming away with tons of inspiration and many hours of concentrated painting practice. 

Stay tuned for the results of this residency in the coming week. I'll give a full roundup when I return to the mountains.