Prints

My mother and I often walk by this house on our “constitutionals”.  The changes that take place in the vegetation on the yard as Spring unfolds are wondrous.  The colors evolve with amazing speed, so that each time we go by it looks different.  After several years of marveling, I decided to try to get it down on paper.

All prints in this edition have been sold.

There is perhaps no image more perfectly symbolic of Maine than a spruce-topped granite island, whatever its size. To board a boat and travel to a populated offshore island is an adventure akin to transporting oneself to a foreign land. Setting sail almost anywhere along the coast provides images of smaller islands of varying sizes, some populated by seals or birds; others topped with trees that cling tenaciously to land bereft of soil. Those familiar with a place called Christmas Cove might put this scene there, but it is, in fact, an iconic Maine image that could be in one of many coastal locales.

Although this print began on Hurricane Island, I suspect this island garden could be found on many of the islands off the coast of Maine.  The original sketches for this print were done while I was visiting friends on Hurricane.  As sometimes happens, I feared this print would be a disaster - the drawing went together too easily, it seemed, and when I pulled the first proof I was amazed at how well everything worked.  Clearly it was a picture that was, from the outset, “meant to be”.

As a child when I occasionally found one of these plants in the woods I marveled at it and thought it a magical rarity. I went back to look for them each year, often without success.  When I moved to Maine I transplanted several from a friend’s garden in Massachusetts, but they didn’t take, as wild flowers are picky about soil and location.  One day I discovered a whole host of them in our woods, moved a few, and they took hold in force. Now they are an annual source of delight, far grander and larger than those ones I first discovered years ago.

Ubiquitous orange day lilies dress up gardens and rock walls for much of July. This image of lilies, rocks, and a view across the bay can offer me, in the dead of winter, a reassuring reminder of summer's golden Maine days.

Many folks refer to these flowers as tiger lilies. For my part, I call them wild day lilies, differentiated from the many varieties of carefully cultivated hybrids that are presently available. For a gardener in Maine, these plants are a staple, as they have numerous helpful attributes. You can be sure they'll bloom throughout the month of July; they will grow in any type of soil; they are undeterred by road salt and sand; they hold no interest for pests; and, they are ignored by deer. Once in place, these beauties take virtually no care. They are, though, not for sale at the garden center, so if you don't have any, you'll need to find a neighbor who'll share.

The village of La Romieu in southern France is noted for its 12th century Collegiate Church of St. Pierre which began life as a Benedictine priory. It also has a village legend about Angeline, a young orphan who saved a couple of cats during a famine that caused the population to eat all the cats. When things improved the crops, in turn, were consumed by rats and mice that had proliferated in the absence of felines. Angeline then released her hidden cats and saved the village from a new famine. Whether one believes the tale or not, it is hard not to be enchanted by the cat sculptures that now appear in odd places about the village. My three “chat” prints are the result of my visit to La Romieu.

The village of La Romieu in southern France is noted for its 12th century Collegiate Church of St. Pierre which began life as a Benedictine priory. It also has a village legend about Angeline, a young orphan who saved a couple of cats during a famine that caused the population to eat all the cats. When things improved the crops, in turn, were consumed by rats and mice that had proliferated in the absence of felines. Angeline then released her hidden cats and saved the village from a new famine. Whether one believes the tale or not, it is hard not to be enchanted by the cat sculptures that now appear in odd places about the village. My three “chat” prints are the result of my visit to La Romieu.

This wonderful little structure, no doubt well into its second or third century, once housed what was an important major food source. Though the loft still has residents, these days this building’s primary use is as a garden shed. It’s accompanied by a well-filed supply of roof tiles, stones, slabs of wood, and stakes, thus covering nearly all eventualities. Newly sprouting leeks graced the first rows of this year’s potager when I did this image in the early days of Spring.