SNAPS: Portraits of Maine
ARTIST STATEMENT: SNAPS
2012 marked my 50th annual return to Maine, where I have a painting studio and a farmhouse in Camden.
As a child my family and I often traveled by car from the Midwest, inching our way up Route 1 to Camden, where my grandmother owned an antique shop. The journey through that landscape remains inscribed in my memory, inseparable from my experiences. This series is comprised of small collages styled as Polaroid snapshots. Each one references a place or experience of Maine, culled from my memory.
I spend the winter months in Chicago, working primarily with oil on canvas, and often use sketches and photographs of the Mid Coast area. One day a discarded palette caught my eye – the stains, smears, and colorful admixtures on wax paper evoked a topography that was abstracted yet familiar. I cropped the dried palettes, modified them, and soon images emerged that suggested roads, fields, mountains and streams. I named them after familiar places: Rockport Harbor, Ragged Mountain, Biddeford Pool, Maids Beach.
The residue of one painting became the core of another.
Lowry discusses her process.