Last updated: April 1, 2023
Article
Sarah Faragher
Courtesy of Sarah Faragher. Used with permission.
It was a dream come true to live and paint at Schoodic Point for three weeks. During the residency I worked outside on a series of oil paintings, filled a watercolor sketchbook, and kept a diary. Landscape painting is my primary passion. The underlying themes in my work encompass feeling at home in nature and homecoming in general. And this is my home landscape: I was born in Bar Harbor and views of Mount Desert Island and the Porcupine Islands are among the earliest views I can remember. Through painting I strive to represent the essence of things, their elemental qualities, as well as a sense of completeness, clarity, and wholeness, the same kind of wholeness I experience when I’m outside painting.
I think painting is one way to connect with what is all around us, and look deeply rather than just glance and move on. Painting a pile of rocks by the ocean – what good is that, you might ask. Well, look at that pile of rocks. If you look closely enough, the story of the whole world can be found there. The rocks are home to hundreds of creatures – barnacle colonies, whelks and periwinkles, seaweeds – and how about the living rocks themselves, beings with light and shadow playing across their surfaces, and water flowing around them ceaselessly, also full of life. More and more, painting nature seems to me to be a quietly yet deeply radical act, a way to say This matters.
– Sarah Faragher
Sarah Faragher was born and raised on the coast of Maine, studied art history and painting at Colby College and the University of Maine, and now lives and works as a professional painter in midcoast Maine. She has attended residencies at Weir Farm National Historic Site and Acadia National Park, and on Great Spruce Head Island. Her work is featured in Drawing New Audiences, Expanding Interpretive Possibilities: Artist-in-Residence Programs of the National Park Service (U.S Department of the Interior 2009), was selected for the 2011 Portland Museum of Art Biennial, and is included in the book Art of Acadia by David Little and Carl Little (Down East Books 2016). Her website is sarahfaragher.com and she is represented by Landing Gallery in Rockland, Maine. Visit her website.