Taking Different
Trails: The Artists’ Journey to Katahdin Lake
Art and
Conservation Converge at Katahdin Lake
January 18-May 24, 2008
The Bates College
Museum of Art presents the exhibition Taking Different Trails: The
Artists’ Journey to Katahdin Lake. The exhibition opens the evening of
Thursday January 17. The public is invited to attend.
This exhibition
will feature the work of 20 contemporary artists and their views of Katahdin
Lake in northern Maine. All of the participating artists were among those
involved in the Katahdin Lake Campaign, which helped preserve a piece of
Maine wilderness containing “pristine Katahdin Lake, an old growth forest,
and a view that has inspired generations of artists.”
Through a
partnership of local and national conservation organizations and approval by
the Maine legislature, a year long fund raising effort was undertaken in
2006, highlighted by an art auction in July. The acquisition of 4,119 acres
of land, including 649-acre Katahdin Lake, and its subsequent transfer by
deed to Baxter State Park in December 2006 was an historic achievement for
the people of Maine.
Accompanying the
featured works will be a display of the Katahdin Lake Campaign, the Katahdin
Lake Wilderness Camps, and works by some of the renowned artists associated
with Katahdin Lake, including Marsden Hartley and James Fitzgerald. The rich
history of the area also includes logging, trail making, sporting camps, and
such notable visitors as the young Teddy Roosevelt and former governor and
philanthropist Percival Baxter.
North Light
Gallery owner/artist Marsha Donahue, artist David Little and Bates College
Museum of Art curator Bill Low have organized an exhibition that focuses
attention on Katahdin Lake and artists who have sought to work at and
protect an important place in deep interior Maine. Accompanying the artwork
will be short statements by the artists, photographs of the artists at work
in the out-of-doors, and visual aids that help identify the topography and
geological features of the area.
The goal of the
exhibit is to celebrate the personal journeys of the artists, highlighting
the merits, inspiration and difficulties of working in the North Woods of
Maine. The organizers want to offer the public a closer look at the artists
of the interior by providing a glimpse of their unique experiences in a
location of unsurpassed beauty. Finally, this exhibition is a thank-you gift
for all those who worked tirelessly to make the Katahdin Lake Campaign a
success.
The exhibition is
one in a year long series at the Bates College Museum of Art exploring
themes related to environmental issues, such as sustainability,
conservation, wilderness, and landscape. For further information on this and
the other exhibitions, please visit the museum website at
www.bates.edu/museum.
