Neil Welliver: Maine Seasons

June 27, 2023 – August 17, 2024

Neil Welliver (1929–2005) is known for his large landscapes of rural Maine. Three of his impressive canvases form this exhibition. The paintings are on loan from Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas. Welliver set up his easel in the state’s woods, along its shorelines, and atop its peaks, in all seasons and all weather. The artist, remarking on working during a Maine winter, said, “It hurts your hands, it hurts your feet, it hurts your ears. … But sometimes there are things you want and that’s the only way you get them.”

In a warmer studio, Welliver translated his painted studies into charcoal-on-paper compositions, which he stapled to a massive canvas. He traced the drawing using a sewing pouncing wheel, which left a pattern of dots on the fabric. He then began painting, starting in the upper left corner and moving across and down. Author and artist Maurice Grosser described Welliver’s process as being “exactly as though he were lowering an upside-down window shade to reveal a landscape already behind it.”

Welliver’s dramatic views of Vacationland, as Maine often calls itself, are notably devoid of humans, except for an imagined hiker-viewer. The artist once said: “I am very interested in the idea of the spectator entering a picture … to, in fact, not see the picture as an object but really actively enter into it … in a psychological sense.”

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, has generously loaned the works in this exhibition. The museum is a lending partner of the Art Bridges’ Partner Loan Network. Art Bridges, established by philanthropist and arts patron Alice Walton, is a foundation dedicated to expanding access to American art across the United States.

 

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