VRAGE Exhibition
2017-04-26 11:00 - 2017-04-28 20:00 (America/New_York)
VRAGE: The Virtual Reality Art Gallery Experience
On view from April 26, 2017 – April 28, 2017, Closing Event: Fri., April 28, 5:00-8:00pm
Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art & Design
ICA Gallery hours: Wed, 11:00am–5:00pm, Thurs, 11:00am–7:00pm, Friday, 11:00am–5:00pm
The Virtual Reality Art Gallery Experience, or VRAGE, is an exploration of the parallel progression of the worlds of technology and fine art, utilizing virtual reality to add context to the typical gallery experience and to showcase art in creative, immersive ways.
Without the restrictions of real-world environments, VRAGE transcends the idea of what an art gallery is supposed to be. Rather than the gallery existing as a separate entity from the art, VRAGE collectively acts as a piece of art in itself. Through game development and 3D modeling techniques, we have the opportunity to tailor individual galleries to represent the vision of the artists in ways that a traditional gallery room could not accomplish. The optimization of space also plays a key role; VRAGE will contain multiple individual gallery rooms within the confines of an eight foot by eight foot play space.

MECA&Dmorphosis 2017: BFA Thesis Exhibition
2017-05-05 09:00 - 2017-05-23 17:00 | Porteous Building, Maine College of Art & Design, 522 Congress Street, Portland, ME, 04101, United States
Friday, May 5, 2017, 5:00–8:00pm
The 2017 Thesis Exhibition Opening will be held in conjunction with the First Friday Artwalk. This year's exhibition features work by over 100 graduating students in our BFA program. Light fare and interactive art on Floors 1, 2 and 3 of the Porteous Building. Free and open to the public. The BFA Thesis Exhibition will be on view through May 23.
For more information contact Dietlind Vander Schaaf at 699.5012 or dvanderschaaf@meca.edu.
Artwork in header is by Greta Wilsterman '17
» View Senior Thesis Online

Dreamy & Surreal
2017-06-30 - 2017-10-20 | Macpage, 30 Long Creek Drive, South Portland, ME, 04106, United States
Dreamy & Surreal
MacPage, 30 Long Creek Dr, South Portland, Maine
On view through October 20, tours/visits must be scheduled

This exhibition features MECA&D alum Celeste Roberge '79 and includes alums Rachael Eastman '94 and Michelle Stuckey '07. Also included are MECA&D faculty and students from various programs.
To schedule a tour of the Macpage exhibits, please email Ralph Hendrix at rrh@macpage.com.
Chris Beneman, Diane Dahlke, Rachael Eastman '94, Rebecca Hayes, Richard Hutchins, Jean Kigel, Julie Lapping Rivera, Mike Libby, Kimberly Lyons, Pamela Moulton, Judy O'Donnell, Alex Rheault, Cheyenne Stubbs, Deb Whitney, Mary Longley, Anne Hecker, Jane Banquer, Maya Kuvaja, Mary Brooking, Michelle Stuckey '07, Cheslye Ventimiglia, and Margareta McDonald
Celeste Roberge '79 lives and works in South Portland. She is Professor Emerita, University of Florida, where she was Head of Sculpture in the School of Art + Art History for twenty-two years. She holds the following degrees: MFA Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, BFA Maine College of Art & Design, BA in Sociology and Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from the University of Maine.
Celeste Roberge '79 has received numerous awards and fellowships. In 2013 she held a residency in the Arts/Industry Program at Kohler in Wisconsin. In 2010 and 2011, she initiated her current work with seaweed as a resident artist at Baie Ste.Marie/Jenny Family Compound in New Edinburgh, Nova Scotia, sponsored by the Maine College of Art & Design. She was a resident artist at SIM in Reykjavik, Iceland in 2007. She has received two Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grants, a MacDowell Colony Fellowship, and she was a Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. Celeste’s sculptures, drawings and prints are included in museums and private collections throughout the United States.
Emily Barrera is an Alfred University BFA graduate of 2014. Emily currently works out of the Button Factory Studios in Portsmouth, NH and has exhibited her work in both upstate New York and New England. She shows a dreamlike quality in her work, illustrating narratives with a quiet mysteriousness to them. She often uses the fresh linear elements of drawing in her paintings that are more rendered and realistic, layering them together to make another strange and surreal compositions.
Meeting While Walking Under the Sea, Algae, textiles, paper, ink, 2016, 15" x 11.25"

RETROSPECTIVE, Portland’s Metals Collective Through the Years
2017-07-07 11:00 - 2017-08-20 17:00 | ICA at MECA&D, 522 Congress St., Portland, Maine, 04101, United States
RETROSPECTIVE, Portland’s Metals Collective Through the Years
Artists at Work Gallery, First Floor, Porteous
Opening Party: July 7th, 5:00pm–8:00pm
On view: July 7—August 20, 2017
The Metals Collective was founded by Maine College of Art & Design Alumni in 2010, and now after 7 years includes more than 25 participating members who to date have put on more than a dozen group shows at local venues, with themes ranging from poison rings to absinthe spoons, pickle forks to tussie mussies. This RETROSPECTIVE will give the public the unique opportunity to revisit these group shows and to see the evolutionary work of 7 individual members, including many pieces available for purchase. Come see what our passionate community of metalsmiths has been up to!
Featured Artists: Ann Thompson, Cat Bates, Emily Percival, Maria Wolff, Mary Forst, Naomi McNeill & Shelby Goldsmith
Viewing Hours: ​​Wednesdays & Thursdays, 11:00am-6:00pm, Fridays & Saturdays, 11:00am-7:00pm, Sundays: 12:00pm–5:00pm
A selection of works from Piercing the Pickle, 2015, The Bearded Lady's Jewel Box.(Left to Right) Emily Percival, Pickle Fork, Sterling Silver. Maria Wolff, Left Handed Relish Spoon, Sterling Silver. Nicholas Downing, Pickle Fork, Steel.

'American Genre: Contemporary Painting' Exhibition
2017-07-20 11:00 - 2017-09-15 17:00 | Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art & Design, first floor
The ICA at Maine College of Art & Design is free and open to the public. Wednesday–Sunday 11:00am–5:00pm, Thursday 11:00am–7:00pm, and First Fridays 11:00am–8:00pm.
American Genre: Contemporary Painting
Hope Gangloff, After Party, 2015, acrylic and collage on paper
On view from July 20, 2017 – September 15, 2017
Exhibition Reception: Thursday, July 20, 2017, 5:00–8:00pm
The Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art & Design is pleased to announce American Genre: Contemporary Painting curated by artist, writer, and curator Michelle Grabner. Grabner is the Crown Family Professor of Art at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
American Genre: Contemporary Painting is an exhibition built on a triad of traditional painting genres: still life, landscape, and portraiture. Fifty-two paintings by fifty-two American artists offers a critical balance to the conditions of atemporality, affected responses, and the material turn shaping much of contemporary painting discourse. Alternatively, this exhibition employs historically recognized groupings of subject and forms. Genres incorporate and invoke structures of knowledge by performing classification. Deeply embedded in everyday life, genre is conspicuous and powerful in its ability to chart historical continuity and differences through its organizing forces.

Artists include:
Still Life: Gina Beavers, Dana DeGiulio, Wendy Edwards, Francesca Fuchs, Hope Gangloff, Evan Gruzis, Angelina Gualdoni, Magalie Guerin, Jessica Halonen, Jonn Herschend, Tucker Nichols, Aliza Nisenbaum, Walter Robinson, Roger White, Griff Williams, Kelly S. Williams, Emi Winter, Mathew Zefeldt
Portraiture: Herman Aguirre, Lucas Ajemian, Deborah Brown, Kristin Calabrese, Brian Calvin, Susanna Coffey, Angela Dufresne, Andreas Fischer, Howard Fonda, Richard Hull, José Lerma, Keith Mayerson, Frank J. Stockton, Henry Taylor, Storm Tharp, Kehinde Wiley
Landscape: Dan Attoe, Peter Barrickman, Amy Bennett, Michael Berryhill, Patrick Chamberlain, Ann Craven, Paula Crown, Cynthia Daignault, Rackstraw Downes, Mari Eastman, Shara Hughes, Brad Killam, Eva Lundsager, Tyson Reeder, John Riepenhoff, Claire Sherman, Gail Spaien, Spencer Sweeney, Emily Sundblad
This exhibition will include an exhibition catalog that also functions as a genre reader. The exhibition will close with a one-day symposium hosted by Maine College of Art & Design, and featuring a panel discussion moderated by Barry Schwabsky on September 15, 2017.
For more information or to request an interview, please contact Erin Hutton, Director of Exhibitions and Special Projects, Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art & Design (ICA), 207.699.5025 or ehutton@meca.edu.

'Wreckage Salad' Exhibition
2017-07-22 13:00 - 2017-08-19 16:00 | Ocean House Gallery, 299 Ocean Road, Cape Elizabeth, ME, United States
Adriane Herman, the Chair of the MFA in Studio Art, has an exhibition opening for Wreckage Salad on Saturday, July 22, from 1:00–4:00pm. The exhibition is at the Ocean House Gallery & Frame, located at 299 Ocean Road in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. The exhibition is on view until August 19; the visiting hours of the gallery are Wed–Friday, 10:00am–5:00pm; Sat, 10:00am–4:00pm.
Adriane Herman, "Wreckage Salad (Big White Board)," 2016, monotype, 21.5 x 28 inches
Adriane Herman’s series of monotypes entitled Wreckage Salad is collaboratively created, inspired by parti-colored piles of castoff wood, which physically dwarf, and aesthetically vie with, much contemporary art. Each print is a unique impression of an ephemeral arrangement of hand-colored shapes representing material found in the municipal woodpile in Cape Elizabeth, Maine, the artist’s home.
Testaments to tidal cycles of accumulation and release, these intimate yet anonymous heaps of barely controlled chaos materially manifest expansion, destruction, renovation, aspiration, failure, labor, entropy, and the inexorable march from birth to death, with (if we’re lucky) many trips to the dump or curb in between.
Ocean House Gallery owner/framer, Graham Wood has framed Herman’s monotypes using reclaimed maple wood flooring, material that otherwise might have found its way to the same woodpile that inspired Herman’s work.
Herman has exhibited and lectured widely, and has work in the collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. She is a Professor at Maine College of Art & Design. Her ongoing collaboration called The Freeing Throwers was profiled on NPR.

I miss you tooooo!!!
2017-07-27 09:00 - 2017-09-08 17:00 | Charles C. Thomas Gallery at Maine College of Art & Design, second floor
I miss you tooooo!!!
An exhibition of prints by Pilar Nadal, MFA '13
On view through September 8, 2017, Monday–Friday, 9am–5pm
Maine College of Art & Design, Charles Thomas Gallery
Pilar Nadal

Life As A Muslim Girl in Maine
2017-07-28 09:00 - 2017-08-16 17:00 | Porteous Building, Maine College of Art & Design, 522 Congress Street, Portland, ME, 04101, United States
Life As A Muslim Girl in Maine: Thoughts, Stories, and Images
A Justice for Women Project
First Friday Art Walk Reception: Friday August 4, 5-8pm
On View: July 28—August 16, 2017, Monday–Friday, 9am-5pm
Maine College of Art & Design, Zand Head and Friedman Galleries
In 2017, the Justice For Women Lecture (JFW) Series welcomed Zainah Anwar of Malaysia. Ms. Anwar is the director of Musawah, a global movement for equality and justice in the Muslim family and a founding member and former executive director of Sisters in Islam. She is at the forefront of the Islamic feminist movement, which seeks to end the use of Islam to justify discrimination against women.
The portraits and accompanying writings featured in “Life as a Muslim Girl in Maine" were inspired by Ms. Anwar’s meetings with young women at Deering High School and Lewiston High School as part of the JFW program this past March. Students met in small groups with Ms. Anwar and shared their stories and experiences as Muslim women. Learning about Ms. Anwar’s work motivated these young women to participate in the creation of this exhibit.
The exhibit is free and open to the public.

"Life as a Muslim Girl in Maine" is made possible by a grant from the Maine Humanities Council which was matched by Lee International.
The Justice For Women Lecture Series would like to thank Catherine Frost, the photographer, for her beautiful work and her support of JFW and the young women who are featured in this exhibit. We would like to thank our framer, Johanna Moore of Lone Pine Projects, LLC. Additionally, we would like to thank the following organizations and individuals for their generous support: City of Portland, Jenn Carter and Lewiston 21st Century Program, Maine College of Art & Design, and Sarah Shmitt and Portland Public Schools.
Photographer, Catherine Frost

Hiraeth
2017-08-11 17:00 - 2017-08-26 20:00
'Hiraeth'
Michel Droge MFA '10, Visiting Assistant Professor
Opening: August 11, 5:00-8:00pm
Gallery Hours: Tues–Sat, 11:00am-6:00pm
On view through August 26, 2017
Frank Bockerman Gallery, 68 Maine St. 3rd floor, Brunswick, Maine

CREATE VI
2017-08-23 09:00 - 2017-09-15 17:00 | Maine College of Art & Design, First Floor, 522 Congress St., Portland, ME, 04101, United States
CREATE VI: MECA&D's 6th Annual Continuing Studies Student & Faculty Exhibition
Porteous, First Floor
On View: August 23–September 15, 2017
Opening Reception: Friday, August 25, 5-7pm
The annual Continuing Studies student and faculty exhibition at MECA&D features a range of work from paintings to photographs to ceramics and highlights the breadth and depth of talent in our local community.

Please click above to enlarge poster.
Artists

Kifah Abdullah
Aileen Agnew
Cynthia Ahlstrin
Nela Alvarez-Sotomayor
Jennifer Battis
Laura Bicherl
Liz Bieber
Annette Cardullo
Kay Carter
Jean-Marie Caterina
Crystal Cawley
Mary Baldwin Collins
Russ Cox
Bess Cutler
Diane Dahlke
Kathryn SB Davis
Deb Dawson
Anna Dibble
Kathleen Donkin
John Doyle
Abby Elder
Betsy Elliman
Hayley Emmons
Amy Fecteau
Rachel Alvarez Flaherty
Adeline Goldminc-Tronzo
Linda Green
Marshall Green
Alicia Greenwald
Katherine Griffin
Cathryn Hammond
James Harrod
Lynn Holler
Janet Hyland
Alison Kamar
Wendy Kaye

Ruth Kepron
Marguerite Lawler
Gilles Letourneau
Carol MacLeod
Margareta McDonald
Richard McFaul
Karen Merritt
Rachel Michaud
Martha Miller
Mary Morse
Maggie Muth
James Neuger
Phoebe Parker
Kerrin Parkinson
Sally Paterson
Emily Percival
Gail Pfeifle
Christina Replogle
Digby Roberts
Wylie Roberts
Jillian Schleicher
Arthur Schaefer
Mary Siteman
Adam Stockman
Tricia Toms
Tammy Towle
Amy Vander Els
Linda Vander Els
Dietlind Vander Schaaf
Kathy Wagner
Kelly Wallace
Mardie Weldon

Kathy Wagner, Rene, oil on panel, 24" x 24"

ICA at MECA&D: American Genre Painting Symposium
2017-09-15 10:00 - 17:00
Portland, Maine ~ The Institute of Contemporary Art in conjunction with the Painting and MFA programs at Maine College of Art & Design (MECA&D) is pleased to invite the public to attend On Genre: A Painting Symposium, a daylong series of conversations about the power of painting and the idea of genre as a cultural structure — one that guides interpretation, anticipation and imagination.
This unique community gathering will spotlight and examine the exhibition American Genre: Contemporary Painting, curated by Michelle Grabner, Crown Family Professor of Art at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Nationally and internationally recognized presenters will be joined by an engaged group of artists, arts leaders and students to share perspectives about still life, landscape and portraiture as categories that chart historical continuity and reveal American value systems. A rich opportunity for extended discussion, Grabners’ exhibition is compelling and approachable, and yields great potential for interpretation and reflection on painting and genre as spaces of agreement.
The morning session will begin with a brief overview by Michelle Grabner, followed a keynote lecture entitled Contemporary Genre Painting: Animating the Intimate by Marie Shurkus, Ph.D, Chair of Academic Studies and Professor of Art History at MECA&D. Drawing insight from the feminist tenet that the personal is political, this talk will analyze how contemporary genre paintings invite audiences to participate in an imaginary realm that activates real consequences.
An afternoon panel discussion, Painting as Common Ground, led by Barry Schwabsky, American poet and the art critic for The Nation (the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States), will explore genre and painting as systems that organize, interpret, translate and imagine history and experience. In response to Michelle Grabner's curatorial focus, five panelists Sharon Butler, Angela Dufresne, Shara Hughes, Chris Stiegler and Roger White will share a variety of perspectives and insights about contemporary painting and illuminate the role of genre as a ubiquitous frame of reference. A community event intended to foster cultural dialogue, audience members will be encouraged to take part in an extended question and answer period following the presentation.
On Genre: A Painting Symposium will end with a closing reception in the ICA. For more information, please contact Erin Hutton, Director of Exhibitions and Special Projects, Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) at Maine College of Art & Design at 207.699.5025 or ica@meca.edu .
This event is free and open to the public. Due to limited seating, RSVP to the September 15th Symposium by emailing ica@meca.edu.
Header Artwork: Dan Attoe, Cedar Tree with Creep, 2017

Adriane Herman: Out of Sorts
2017-09-16 12:00 - 2017-10-14 18:00 | SPEEDWELL, 630 Forest Avenue, Portland, ME, 04101, United States
Adriane Herman: Out of Sorts
On view September 16–October 14 at SPEEDWELL

Surrender Sunday
Sunday, October 1, 2-4pm
First Friday Art Walk
Friday, Oct 6, 4-8pm
Artist talk with Adriane Herman
Friday, October 13, 6pm
Emotional Value Auction/Closing Reception
Saturday, October 14, 12-5pm

Visit SPEEDWELL's site for more information.
Read Portland Press Herald's "Artist Adriane Herman’s changing lives, one project at a time."

SPEEDWELL projects proudly presents Out of Sorts, an exhibition orchestrated by experience broker, Adriane Herman, which explores cycles of accumulation and release in our physical and emotional landscapes. Opening September 16th with a reception from 5-8 pm, the show invites visitors to consider individual and collective consumption as manifest in five mini-bales of recyclable materials that non-profit solid waste manager, ecomaine compressed and loaned for the exhibition. Also on view are photographs Herman took of our trash being incinerated and our recycling being sorted both mechanically and by hand.
Herman is pressing pause on the recycling process to allow visitors to contemplate their own patterns of consumption, as well as the various conduits for release available to us, and the personal, cultural and global implications of material excess and disposability. To facilitate such reflections, Out of Sorts includes benches fabricated from salvaged wood by Benjamin Spalding and upholstered by Amy Emmons with fabric printed with Herman’s photographs of bales of recycling and municipal woodpiles. Visitors can sit on the plushly cushioned benches and register the visual, visceral, and psychological impact of what she calls “simultaneously minimalist and maximalist monuments to communal efforts to keep things out of the landfill.” Materially manifest in the strata of these intimate yet anonymous commodities is evidence of how we eat, drink, work, play, and clean, and how much attention we pay to discarding things responsibly.
In addition to a First Friday Reception October 6 from 4–8pm, ecomaine’s Environmental Educator, Katrina Venhuizen, will discuss the “art” of recycling and the importance of composting food waste on Friday, September 29th from 6-8 pm. Additional events include two “witnessed releases” Herman is choreographing, including Surrender Sunday, when anyone looking to let go of something weighing them down can consult one-on-one with a compassionate listener/receiver on Sunday, October 1st from 12-2 pm. Herman will give an artist talk Friday, October 13th at 6 pm. Out of Sorts ends with an Emotional Value Auction on Saturday, October 14th from 12-5 pm. Anyone interested in releasing an object they desire to pass on to someone who will value it and know its history can inquire about participation by emailing adrianeherman@gmail.com. “Bids” will take the form of written statements of interest in an item. At the end of the “auction,” each item’s owner may choose a winner. Everyone is welcome to witness these meaningful exchanges between strangers. All events take place at 630 Forest Avenue.
Herman has exhibited widely and lectured at over fifty institutions. Her work is in collections including the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. She is a Professor of the MFA in Visual Art at Maine College of Art & Design, and holds a BA from Smith College and an MFA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Out of Sorts, a subsidiary of Herman’s projects Goods Riddance, and The Freeing Throwers, was facilitated by ecomaine, Hour Exchange Portland, The KISMET Foundation, and Yarmouth Public Works.
SPEEDWELL projects is an artist-run studio and gallery dedicated to launching thought-provoking exhibitions in all media, including site-specific installations, public art, spoken word and performance.

Chinese Brush Painting: Christine Maclin
2017-09-20 09:00 - 2017-10-25 17:00
Chinese Brush Painting: An Exhibition of Christine Maclin's Work
On view through September 20–October 25, Monday–Friday, 9am–5pm
Reception: Wednesday, September 20, 5–7pm
Maine College of Art & Design, Charles Thomas Gallery, Second floor
Learn more about Christine Macklin in the Portland Press Herald article, A grieving husband honors his wife by curating a show of her Chinese brush paintings.
Christine Maclin, Flowers

2017 Salt Alumni Exhibition
2017-10-06 09:00 - 2017-11-12 17:00 | ICA at MECA&D, 522 Congress St., Portland, Maine, 04101, United States
2017 Salt Alumni Exhibition
October 6–November 10, 2017
Opening Reception: Friday, October 6, 2017, 5:00-8:00pm
Artists at Work Gallery, First Floor, Porteous Building
This exhibition features the work of thirteen alumni from the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies, which is now a graduate certificate program at MECA&D. As we welcome Salt to campus— Fall 2017 students are the inaugural class – we honor the history of Salt and its long commitment to documentary storytelling.
Featured artists include: Abigail Holtzman '14, Adam Kampe '05, Alexandra Marvar '06, David Foster '10, Douglas W. Milliken '05, Grace Mendenhall '13, Jodie Goodnough '07, Kristin Moe '12, Molly Graham '09, Morgan Springer '14, Posey Gruener '05, Stephanie Mitchell '95, Thalassa Raasch '12.
Thalassa Raasch, Dessert from the series Rim Road, 2015

Confabulations of Millennia
2017-10-06 11:00 - 2017-12-08 17:00 | Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art & Design, first floor
Confabulations of Millennia
On view from October 6–December 8, 2017
Exhibition Reception: Friday, October 6, 2017, 5:00–8:00pm
Melora Kuhn, Waterfall Bust, 2016
Curated by artist Richard Saja, Confabulations of Millennia brings together the works of 19 contemporary artists who take direct inspiration from the 18th and 19th centuries. Using established styles, techniques and objects perfected in the 18th and 19th centuries, the 19 artists assembled deploy history as a springboard in order to speak to the intricacies and inconsistencies of modern life be they social, political or aesthetic.
Artists include: Martha Arquero, John Brauer, Joey Chiarello, Emily Diaz Norton, Douglas Goldberg, Jeremy Hatch, Beth Katleman, Ryan Wilson Kelly, Melora Kuhn, Livia Marin, Oscar Sancho Nin, John O'Reilly, Erin M. Riley, Richard Saja, Anthony Sonnenberg, Ryan Swanson, Vadis Turner, Julia Whitney Barnes, Kehinde Wiley
Masthead Image: Beth Katleman, Hostile Nature, USA (detail), 2014
The ICA at Maine College of Art & Design is free and open to the public. Wednesday–Sunday 11:00am–5:00pm, Thursday 11:00am–7:00pm, and First Fridays 11:00am–8:00pm.

Opening: 'Confabulations of Millennia'
2017-10-06 17:00 - 20:00 | Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art & Design, first floor
Confabulations of Millennia
On view from October 6 - December 8, 2017
Exhibition Reception: Friday, October 6, 2017, 5:00–8:00pm
Curated by artist Richard Saja, Confabulations of Millennia brings together the works of 19 contemporary artists who take direct inspiration from the 18th and 19th centuries. Using established styles, techniques and objects perfected in the 18th and 19th centuries, the 19 artists assembled deploy history as a springboard in order to speak to the intricacies and inconsistencies of modern life be they social, political or aesthetic.
Melora Kuhn, Waterfall Bust, 2016
Artists include: Martha Arquero, John Brauer, Joey Chiarello, Emily Diaz Norton, Douglas Goldberg, Jeremy Hatch, Beth Katleman, Ryan Wilson Kelly, Melora Kuhn, Livia Marin, Oscar Sancho Nin, John O'Reilly, Erin M. Riley, Richard Saja, Anthony Sonnenberg, Ryan Swanson, Vadis Turner, Julia Whitney Barnes
Masthead Image: Beth Katleman, Hostile Nature, USA (detail), 2014
The ICA at Maine College of Art & Design is free and open to the public. Wednesday–Sunday 11:00am–5:00pm, Thursday 11:00am–7:00pm, and First Fridays 11:00am–8:00pm.

Q&A + Exhibition Walkthrough: Confabulations of Millennia
2017-10-07 11:00 - 13:00
Join us in the ICA at MECA&D for a Q&A and Exhibition Walk-Through — with Guest Curator Richard Saja and the artists from Opening: 'Confabulations of Millennia' exhibition.
Richard Saja, Guest Curator. Participating Artists: Erin M. Riley, Melora Kuhn, Beth Katleman, and Anthony Sonnenberg
Artwork in Header:
Richard Saja, A Three Day Party (detail), 2016
Confabulations of Millennia
On view from October 6 - December 8, 2017
Exhibition Reception: Friday, October 6, 2017, 5:00–8:00pm
Melora Kuhn, Waterfall Bust, 2016
Curated by artist Richard Saja, Confabulations of Millennia brings together the works of 19 contemporary artists who take direct inspiration from the 18th and 19th centuries. Using established styles, techniques and objects perfected in the 18th and 19th centuries, the 19 artists assembled deploy history as a springboard in order to speak to the intricacies and inconsistencies of modern life be they social, political or aesthetic.
Artists include: Martha Arquero, John Brauer, Joey Chiarello, Emily Diaz Norton, Douglas Goldberg, Jeremy Hatch, Beth Katleman, Ryan Wilson Kelly, Melora Kuhn, Livia Marin, Oscar Sancho Nin, John O'Reilly, Erin M. Riley, Richard Saja, Anthony Sonnenberg, Ryan Swanson, Vadis Turner, Julia Whitney Barnes
Masthead Image: Beth Katleman, Hostile Nature, USA (detail), 2014
The ICA at Maine College of Art & Design is free and open to the public. Wednesday–Sunday 11:00am–5:00pm, Thursday 11:00am–7:00pm, and First Fridays 11:00am–8:00pm.

MAKE.ART.THINK.
2017-11-03 17:00 - 20:00 | 360 Cumberland, 360 Cumberland, Portland, ME, 04101, United States
Reception: Friday, November 3, 5-8pm
380 Cumberland, Portland, Maine
An exhibition highlighting the collaboration between MECA&D's MAT program and students from Portland and South Portland LearningWorks Afterschool sites. Additionally, there will be a celebration of 21st Century Learning with afterschool programs from around Portland at MECA&D's Green Space, located next to the 380 Cumberland building.
Make.Art.Think is supported by Jeremy Moser and Laura Kittle through a gift from the Moser Family Foundation.

#MECA&Dmade Showcase
2017-12-06 10:00 - 2017-12-23 17:00
#MECA&Dmade is a pop-up shop in Artists at Work from December 6–23 featuring selected alumni work.
Regular Hours

Monday–Thursday, 10am–5pm
Friday, 10am–7pm
Saturday, 11am–4pm

Special Hours

Thursday, Dec. 7 until 7pm as part of Merry Madness
Saturday, Dec. 23, from 10am–5pm for last minute shoppers

The #MECA&Dmade showcase will include the following artists: Kari Radasch '97, Eric Drzewianowsk '04, Kristin Fitzpatrick '13, Maggie Muth '11, LK Weiss '11, Amalia Guettinger '12, John Nelson '12, Shannon Owen '14, Kelsey Haley '15, Tabitha Barnard '16, Sophie Cangelosi '16, Melinda Aste '17, Meg Hahn '17, Eden McDowell '17 and faculty member Adriane Herman.
Also participating is Might and Main, a local design firm co-founded by MECA&D alum Sean Wilkinson '01 and employing alums Morgan DiPietro '11, Sarah McLean '14, Sabrina Volante '14, Miekala Cangelosi '16, and intern Mackenzie Mangosing, a current student. As an homage to Maine, Might & Main created a collection of usable goods marked with the word that has proclaimed our state’s mission since declaring independence in 1820: “Dirigo,” Latin for “I Lead.”
For more information contact us at ArtistsAtWork@meca.edu.

PROXIMITY: Salt Final Exhibition
2017-12-14 17:00 - 2017-12-15 19:30
Proximity

Thursday, December 14, 5-7:30pm
Osher Hall at Maine College of Art & Design
Free and open to the public

Proximity features work by Salt at MECA&D’s inaugural class. Via their commitment to documenting the experiences of others, dedication to the craft of narrative, and camaraderie in the classroom, these nineteen storytellers have built a collective body of work which honors the spirit and history of this program while also marking a new chapter in the story of Salt.
Over the past four decades, Salt students have told the stories of hundreds of people from across Maine and New England, and the program became known for an approach to storytelling that is as thoughtful as it is rigorous. The name “Salt” was chosen by the first group of students to complete the program: it represents Maine’s deep sense of place, its many subcultures, and the tenacity required to live and work off the beaten track. In 2016, Maine College of Art & Design acquired the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies and developed a graduate certificate program commonly known as Salt at MECA&D.
Please join us for this semester’s final exhibition.
Featured Artists: Nora Boydell, Kristen Cabrera, Mac Christopher, Eliza Dennis, Dara Fruchter, Casey Georgi, Leila Goldstein, Jennifer Kinney, Pallavi Kottamasu, Olivia Norrmén-Smith, Phoebe Parker, Christopher Seigel, Justin Sloan, Rick Stark, Harry Sultan, Samira Tazari, Alix Towler, Joel Tsui, and Tressa Versteeg.
Header: Phoebe Parker MFA '17
Poster:
Click for bigger size.

'Aubades' Exhibition: Michel Droge MFA '10
2018-01-05 10:00 - 2018-01-31 18:00
Michel Droge: Aubades
On view from January 5–31, 2018
Located at Anthropologie (60 Pearl St, Portland, ME)
Viewing Hours: 10am–6pm
In this exhibition, Michel Droge MFA '10 (Visiting Assistant Professor of Printmaking and Foundation) presents 53 small paintings.
Michel Droge, Aubade #1
"Aubade... a French word for a song or poem of lovers parting at dawn.
These small paintings are my Aubades...they are for Love and early mornings and the sweetness and....for You. My song , my heart
The sky is white as clay, with no sun."
—Philip Larkin (from Aubade)

Masthead image by Michel Droge (cropped)

Images of Children/Youth Exhibition + Opening
2018-01-11 09:00 - 2018-04-01 17:00 | 716 Stevens Avenue, 716 Stevens Avenue, Portland, Maine, 04101
Opening Reception of Images of Children/Images of Youth: Period and Contemporary Photographs

Opening Reception: January 11, 2018, 5–7pm
On view from January 11—April 1, 2018
Curated by Stephen K. Halpert, Assistant Professor in Academic Studies
Featuring work by Charles Melcher, Associate Professor in Graphic Design

Postcard, click to view larger.
What is the definition of a child? For many of us the word may conjure up an image of someone young and small, perhaps vulnerable and dependent. But societies, laws and customs may not conform to that. What is the age of consent, of driving a car, buying cigarette, serving in the army? Of having a crime tried in juvenile court? What do their cultures call the ten-year-old armed soldiers spreading terror in distant villages? (For parents they are our children forever.)
In this exhibition, photographs from around the world, shot just yesterday, or a near-century ago, depict the protected nursing infant, the hard working field hand, the fear of abandonment, the joy of friends swimming in the river. The age cut is arbitrary. Images of Children knowingly expands the term. Here are a hundred fine photographs, many from the University’s own collection, and many by Maine artists working today.
Learn more about UNE's Art Galleries here.

Located at University of New England's Art Gallery, Portland Campus

716 Stevens Avenue, Portland, 207.221.4499

Free and open to the public

Masthead image: Judy Glickman Lauder, Adult and Child in Israel (cropped)

STILL STANDING: The Abyssinian Meeting House Story Archive
2018-01-24 09:00 - 2018-02-24 17:00 | ICA at MECA&D, 522 Congress St., Portland, Maine, 04101, United States
STILL STANDING, The Abyssinian Meeting House Story Archive
Opens Friday (Artwalk), February 2, 2018
On view January 24—February 24, 2018
Artists at Work Project Space
SALT Program in Documentary Studies will be conducting live interviews and audio recording on first Friday, February 2 and there will be a Story Circle event on Saturday, February 3 from 3-6PM. All events are free and open to the public.

The Public Engagement Program at Maine College of Art & Design presents the exhibition STILL STANDING, The Abyssinian Meeting House Story Archive, to be held at Maine College of Art & Design. The show is a culmination of a three year oral history and storytelling project with elders and community leaders from Portland and students at MECA&D.
The Abyssinian Meeting House is full of great stories. In 1866 it survived The Great Fire when fireman and member William Wilberforce Ruby saved it by covering it in wet blankets courtesy of spring running through the building’s basement. The Abyssinian Meeting House functioned as a cultural center and a leading contributor to The Underground Railroad. After years of vacancy, this cultural center was almost lost again in the 1970’s when it was slated for demolition by the city. Deborah Cummings Khadraoui rediscovered this important cultural center and catalyzed its restoration. As the third oldest African American meeting house in the country, The Abyssinian Meeting House is an important American cultural landmark.
For the past three years, students in the Public Engagement class Storytelling 101 have collaborated with The Abyssinian Meeting House to celebrate its story. For this project, students interviewed African American elders in Maine, to create an archive of stories to be housed at The Abyssinian Meeting House. By documenting these stories, the partnership aimed to honor the contribution and experience of African American elders by creating an archive of stories for future generations. Still Standing is the culminating event to celebrate the importance of African American experiences in Portland and communicate the significance of this history in the state of Maine.
The exhibition features audio, text and photographs from all three years of the project. The exhibition opens on first Friday, February 2, 2018 and runs from January 24, 2018–February 24, 2018 in the Artists at Work Gallery at 522 Congress Street, Portland. Students from the SALT Program in Documentary Studies will be conducting live interviews and audio recording on first Friday, February 2 and there will be a Story Circle event on Saturday, February 3 from 3:00-6:00PM. All events are free and open to the public.
Header
Lelia DeAndrade at the 2016 Still Standing event in the ICA. (Photography by Kyle Dubay '18)
For more information contact
Elizabeth A. Jabar, Associate Dean + Director of Public Engagement, ejabar@meca.edu
Quote from one of the interviews:
Because the true story of the black community, the African Americans in Maine, in Portland, they’ve done an awful lot of good. History books have not been kind to the African Americans here in Maine, or in Portland. But we’re changing that. We’re the Abyssinian, we’re changing that. Make sure the history books at least tell part of the story, the true story. At least from this point on, if anybody beat the drum I think we beat the drum, we helped make Portland a better place to live for the people that were here as well as for my family. — Leonard Cummings

ME Scholastic Art Awards Exhibition
2018-01-27 09:00 - 2018-02-10 17:00
Maine Region Scholastic Art Awards Exhibition at Maine College of Art & Design
January 27–February 10, 2018
Porteous, First Floor
The Maine Region Scholastic Art Award Exhibition features juried work submitted by 7th to 12th graders who are attending schools in Maine. The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards is the nation’s longest-running and most prestigious recognition initiative for creative teens. Maine’s regional Gold Key, Silver Key, Honorable Mention, and American Visions & Voices Nomination recipients are honored locally through community ceremonies and exhibitions.
Page Header Credit: Caitlyn Duffy, Mantra, Grade 12, Art Teacher: Chris Crosby, Gorham High School

The Peoples State of the Union Story Circle
2018-02-03 15:00 - 18:00 | Artists at Work Project Space, 522 Congress St., Portland, ME, 04101, United States
The Peoples State of the Union Story Circle, in conjunction with the exhibition Still Standing: The Abyssinian Meeting House Story Archive.
The Peoples State of the Union Story Circle
February 3, 2018 from 3pm–6pm
Opens Friday (Artwalk), February 2, 2018
On view January 24—February 24, 2018
Artists at Work Project Space, 522 Congress Stress
Free and open to the public
MECA&D and the Abyssinian Meeting House invite community members to share stories that reflect on the current state of our union and hopes for the future.

About

On Saturday, February 3, the Public Engagement Program and The Abyssinian Meeting House along with the U.S. Department of Arts and Culture (USDAC.us) and organizations across the country, will invite the public to participate in the People’s State of the Union #PSOTU2018. Community members will take part in Story Circles, sharing personal experiences that reveal the state of our union. This event coincides with the exhibit Still Standing: The Abyssinian Meeting House Story Archive on view at Maine College of Art & Design. In addition to participants engaging in Story Circles, the event will feature an introduction and performances from the Abyssinian Meeting House community and art-making activities from local socially engaged printmakers the Ears and Hands Collective.
In January of most years, the President delivers a State of the Union Address highlighting the past year and suggesting priorities for the coming year. It’s a broadcast from one to many. But democracy is a conversation, not a monologue. Understanding the state of our union takes We the People reflecting in our own communities on our challenges and opportunities locally, nationally, and globally.
Since 2015, the USDAC has hosted the People’s State of the Union as an invitation to supplement the President’s stories by coming together in our own homes, schools, houses of worship, and community organizations to share our own take on the state of our union. Thousands of people in more than 350 communities have taken part over the last three years, and this year between January 25-February 4, 2018, individuals and organizations will again host Story Circles across the U.S.
Maine College of Art & Design, Public Engagement Program and The Abyssinian Meeting House will be hosting Story Circles to reflect on the current state of our union and share brief stories of hope, belonging or not belonging from the past year. The free event will take place from 3pm to 6pm.
After the Story Circles, participants who wish can upload their stories and images to an online platform, yielding a body of stories that can be searched and shared, inspiring new ideas and new actions. This repository of stories will also provide the source material for the Poetic Address to the Nation, collaboratively composed and performed by poets from across the country that will be performed live on April 15th from the Public Theater in NYC and live-streamed with poetry, theater, music, and more.
The Abyssinian Meeting House is a historic church building at 73–75 Newbury Street, in the Munjoy Hill neighborhood of Portland, Maine. Built 1828-1831 by free African-Americans, it is Maine's oldest African-American church building, and the third oldest in the nation. The Public Engagement Minor at Maine College of Art & Design is a four year curricular pathway that integrates art, real-world problems and community partners. Students work with a range of partners in a variety of public contexts to address and solve complex issues in our project and problem-based courses. The U.S. Department of Arts and Culture (USDAC) is not an official government agency. It is a people-powered movement dedicated to cultivating empathy, equity, and social imagination. For more information visit usdac.us/psotu.

'Till the Night' Exhibition – Kyle Patnaude
2018-03-03 10:00 - 2018-04-29 21:00 | Brooklyn Metal Works, 640 Dean Street, Brooklyn, NY, 04101, United States
Till The Night
Brooklyn Metal Works
640 Dean Street, Brooklyn, New York
On view March 3–April 29, 2018
Open to the public
Kyle Patnaude’s (Assistant Professor in Metalsmithing & Jewelry) work explores the emotive and humanistic coding of objects, specifically a certain “queerness” pertaining to the cultural guise of hypermasculinity. In Till The Night Patnaude works with queer narratives, from inherently counter-culture gay tropes to the Homoromanticism of masculine power within authoritarian regimes. Using historical figures as touch points Patnaude constructs representational characters to develop this dialog throughout the exhibition.
Included in these investigations are themes of persecution. Says Patnaude “Where much of queer work celebrates the progressive gay narrative, I choose to cultivate from darker regions of my community and culture. For several years Russia and the southern Republic of Chechnya have committed hundreds of acts of abduction, torture, and murder of men suspected of being homosexual. The exhibition features nineteen aluminum photo prints of gay and trans men with their eyes pixelated. The audience determines their identities through implication as victim or criminal, their erasure, or preservation of anonymity—and themselves as either activist or bystander.”

'Till The Night' by Kyle Patnaude will be on view In the Gallery at Brooklyn Metal Works from March 3–April 29, 2018. An artist talk will be held on April 22 at 1:00pm. All events are open to the public.
Header Image: Kyle Pautnaude

You Never Know How You Look Through Other People's Eyes
2018-03-08 11:00 - 2018-04-20 17:00
The ICA at Maine College of Art & Design is free and open to the public. Wednesday–Sunday 11:00am–5:00pm, Thursday 11:00am–7:00pm, and First Fridays 11:00am–8:00pm.
You Never Know How You Look Through Other People's Eyes
On view from March 8 - April 20, 2018
Exhibition Reception: Thursday, March 8, 2018, 5:00–8:00pm
Sean Downey, Untitled, 2017
“Cinnamon and sugary and softly spoken lies, you never know just how you look through other people’s eyes.” - Gibby Haynes, 1996
In the summer of 1996 pop culture gave us the songPepperby the Butthole Surfers. Deceptively playful, the lyrics make clear the impossibility of having first-hand knowledge of the self by boldly stating that you can never fully know who you are to someone else. The artists involved allow their works to exist sympathetically and in spite of each other for an exhibition that proposes a state of coexistence at odds with itself. Within this experimental framework they free and restrict through unpredictability. All involved are both collective collaborator and individual practitioner within a complex network that confirms and denies the possibilities of true egalitarianism toward some kind of antagonistic equilibrium. This exhibition is curated by artist Scott Patrick Wiener. Artists include: Sonia Almeida, Paul S. Briggs, Caleb Charland, Sean Downey, Sean Fader, Sean Glover, Jaclyn Jacunski, AJ Liberto, Lilly McElroy, Eric Petitti, Scott Patrick Wiener.
Masthead Image: Jaclyn Jacunski, Lay of the Land (2017-18), process detail, 2017-18

Opening Reception: You Never Know How You Look Through Other People's Eyes
2018-03-08 17:00 - 19:00
You Never Know How You Look Through Other People's Eyes
Exhibition Reception: Thursday, March 8, 2018, 5:00–7:00pm
On view from March 8 - April 20, 2018
Sean Downey, "Untitled," 2017
“Cinnamon and sugary and softly spoken lies, you never know just how you look through other people’s eyes.” - Gibby Haynes, 1996
In the summer of 1996 pop culture gave us the songPepperby the Butthole Surfers. Deceptively playful, the lyrics make clear the impossibility of having first-hand knowledge of the self by boldly stating that you can never fully know who you are to someone else. The artists involved allow their works to exist sympathetically and in spite of each other for an exhibition that proposes a state of coexistence at odds with itself. Within this experimental framework they free and restrict through unpredictability. All involved are both collective collaborator and individual practitioner within a complex network that confirms and denies the possibilities of true egalitarianism toward some kind of antagonistic equilibrium. This exhibition is curated by artist Scott Patrick Wiener. Artists include: Sonia Almeida, Paul S. Briggs, Caleb Charland, Sean Downey, Sean Fader, Sean Glover, Jaclyn Jacunski, AJ Liberto, Lilly McElroy, Eric Petitti, Scott Patrick Wiener.
Masthead Image: Caleb Charland, Cube with Phosphorescent Particles (cropped), 2015, Pigmented ink print , 40×32 inches
The ICA at Maine College of Art & Design is free and open to the public. Wednesday–Sunday 11:00am–5:00pm, Thursday 11:00am–7:00pm, and First Fridays 11:00am–8:00pm.

Q+A and Exhibition Walkthrough: You Never Know How You Look Through Other People's Eyes
2018-04-06 15:30 - 16:30 | Institute of Contemporary Art at Maine College of Art & Design, first floor
Q+A and Exhibition Walkthrough:
You Never Know How You Look Through Other People's Eyes
Friday, April 6, 2018 - 3:30PM
Join us in the ICA at MECA&D for a Q&A and Exhibition Walk-Through — with Guest Curator Scott Patrick Wiener and the participating artists from the exhibition.
Participating Artists: Sean Fader, Sean Downey, Sean Glover

Collect: Summer Art Sale
2018-06-28 10:00 - 18:00
