Stonington Galleries

S T O N I N G T O N G A L L E R I E S

First Friday Open Gallery Night

July 3 from 4 to 7 pm

Stonington--An exciting season opens for Stonington Galleries' Open Gallery Night on Friday, July 3rd from 4 to 7 p.m. Eight galleries and artist studios will throw open their doors for a festive evening that will include new exhibits, gallery talks and memorable refreshments.

Jill Hoy, Weir Island & Isle au Haut

Award-winning artist Jill Hoy will reveal her sources of inspiration and process and how they differ in a talk entitled, Plein Air Painting vs. Winter Narratives which will begin at 5 p.m. at the Jill Hoy Gallery at 80 Main Street. She is well known for her paintings of local landscapes in vibrant strokes of color. Just around the corner, the gWatson Gallery will ask the public to Consider the Lobster, realistic or in the abstract, with paintings, prints and photographs by 23 artists. And further down the street, Isalos Fine Art will present Paper Holds Water, large-scale black and white images by Emily Brown to coincide with her session on the faculty at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts.

Just up the hill from Hoy Gallery you will find The Seasons of Stonington (formerly, The Clown) with an inviting new wing and renovated upstairs gallery that features pottery, metalwork, photography and paintings by Maine artists. From there, climb N. Seabreeze Avenue to the Lorraine Lans Studio to view her mix of plein air landscapes and arresting portraits. Half a mile north on Rt. 15, designer Geoffrey Warner will be introducing his Owl Stool, available as a kit or a finished work in his new line of affordable furniture. He will be demonstrating how to assemble his kits at the opening and will be offering workshops this summer.

Two doors up from his gallery is the Anne-Claude Cotty Gallery & Workshops showing her new work Grace Notes in found and formed metals, along with artist books and pinhole photographs. Near the west end of the Airport Road is the Siri Beckman Studio and a chance to enjoy her new prints and paintings as well as the artist's beautiful portfolio of wood engravings.

First Fridays in Stonington will be held through October. A map and full-color brochure is available at area businesses and by visiting stoningtongalleries.com where you will find news of events and links to the individual galleries. For more information, call 367-2699 or 367-2700.

Lorraine Lans, Stonington Overlook, oil

Plein air painter Lorrane Lans is featuring forty oil paintings of Stonington Harbor and about the town for the July 3rd first Stonington Galleries First Friday Open Gallery Night of 2009. The title of this event, which opens Friday, June 26th, is "Old Home Week" a treat for all those new or returning to visit Stonington.

The gWatson Gallery is presenting a group exhibition of new paintings entitled Consider the Lobster. Twenty-three artists, most of whom regularly exhibit in the Gallery, have created images inspired by Maine’s iconic crustacean.

Nancy Bea Miller, Lobster with Brioche, 2009,

Oil on canvas, 18x24 inches

The paintings range from the photo realism of Mark Workman to the abstractions of Robin Reynolds and Hannah Bureau. Pamela Parsons and Nancy Morgan Barnes contribute pictures of lobsters in their environment. Nancy Bea Miller and Alexandra Tyng prepare their lobsters on a plate. To the table, Joel Janowitz delivers six montotypes; and Jon Imber brings three small paintings. The exhibition celebrates the creativity of these twenty-three artists and salutes the men and women who sustain the area’s most important industry: lobster fishing.

Consider the Lobster opens on Friday, June 26. A Celebration of artists and their lobster images will take place on Friday, July 3 from 4 to 7 PM.

Siri Beckman, Creation of Atom, oil

Siri Beckman recently received an award from The Project for Nuclear Awareness for her painting "Creation of Atom." The painting was part of a show at the University of the Arts, in Philadelphia, intended as a "visual petition for deep cuts in global nuclear weapons." 

The deadline for submissions for Isalos Fine Art's OHA Tenth Anniversary Exhbibition has been extended from June 1st to June 15th. Visit the call for entries on the Isalos site for more information.