RSS Feed | FAQs | Contact Us | Sitemap | Privacy Policy
Web solution by Digital Goat
Archipelago
Fine Arts Gallery
Established in 2007, Archipelago Fine Arts Gallery provides a venue for Maine’s island and coastal artists to showcase larger works. Hosting exhibits by renowned painters, sculptors, glass-blowers and artists who work in many different media, the gallery displays visions of the Gulf of Maine on Main Street in Rockland.
Our People
Some of our talented people working in this area.
 | Cathe Brown Assistant Archipelago Manager |
Lisa Mossel Vietze Archipelago Manager |
Singing With Truth
Acclaimed children’s book author, illustrator and Islesford (Little Cranberry Island) resident Ashley Bryan will bring a selection of his vibrant, joy-infused work to Archipelago Fine Arts, the Island Institute’s art gallery at 386 Main Street in Rockland, for this year’s major summer show.
The author or illustrator of more than 30 books, Bryan became, in 1962, the first African-American to publish a book as both author and illustrator. His books have won several awards in children’s literature, including the Coretta Scott King Award and the Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal. He is one of the New York Public Library’s “Literary Lions”, and the recent winner of a Golden Kite award, the only prize awarded to a children’s book author by his or her peers. After a lengthy college-teaching career, Bryan retired as emeritus professor of art at Dartmouth College in 1988 and came to live year-round on Islesford, an island he’d first visited four decades earlier and had returned to at every opportunity.
Bryan is a “plein air” painter, who has worked in oils but now paints primarily in acrylics. According to author and art critic Carl Little, whose article on Bryan and an accompanying folio of his work can be found in the 2010 edition of Island Journal, Bryan is “searching for essential rhythms in the landscape.” As Bryan himself explains in the article, “The eye is always on some kind of voyage of adventure to try and understand the relationships of how the areas work.” Little calls Islesford “the ideal place” for Bryan to work, and his home “the site of amazing creative work, from a host of award-winning children’s books to windows made from sea glass, from lively canvases of flower gardens and blooming pear trees to puppets made from odds and ends found on the rocky beaches.”
Echoing award-winning poet Naomi Shihab Nye’s comment that Bryan is “a luminous force of nature,” Peter Ralston, executive vice-president and co-founder of the Island Institute, is especially thrilled and honored to welcome him to Archipelago. “Ashley’s work so perfectly mirrors the man. I don’t use the word “reveals,’ for to meet Ashley, however briefly, is to stand in the presence of a perfectly open, glowing and loving spirit. The world would be a better place with more Ashleys in it.”
Examples of Bryan’s work can be found by clicking on the gallery to the right. The 2010 edition of Island Journal is also available on the site and in the retail store adjacent to the gallery. Current gallery hours for Archipelago Fine Arts are 9:30-5:30, Monday through Friday, 9:30-5:00 on Saturdays, and 11:00-4:00 on Sundays. The Singing With Truth show will run until September 19th.
News |
| Jun 21, 2010 | | Major Summer Show by Islesford's Ashley Bryan |
| May 07, 2010 | | 2010 Spring Highlights |
| Mar 05, 2010 | | 2010 Spring Show at Archipelago Fine Arts Features Two Maine Artists |
Publications & Resources |
 | 2010 Island Journal - Volume 26 |
| | 2009 Island Journal Volume 25 |
| | 2008 Island Journal |
In Working Waterfront |
Singing with Truth
August 2010
August 2010
Students in photo camp see islands in a new way
December 2008-January 2009
December 2008-January 2009