Eric Hopkins, “Spring Islands,” 1988, oil on canvas, Collection of the Farnsworth Art Museum, Museum purchase 1999. Courtesy of the Farnsworth Art Museum
Maine residents eager to return to art museums won’t have to wait any longer — many art museums across the state are opening this week, if they hadn’t already. In accordance with COVID-19 safety precautions, masks, one-way walking patterns in galleries and mandatory social distancing between groups now will be the norm for patrons enjoying art indoors for the first time since March.
Some museums, however, will remain closed this summer. After a minor fire in late May, the Maine Jewish Museum sustained significant damage from water and smoke, and while planning the restoration, decided to make other improvements it had been hoping to make prior to the fire. The museum has been closed since mid-March due to COVID-19 and will remain closed through at least September, according to its website.
The art museums at Bates, Bowdoin and Colby colleges and the University of Maine, as well as the Abbe Museum in Bar Harbor, are all closed to the public indefinitely.
Here’s what you need to know about visiting the museums that are open, and what you’ll see there.
Still from “Lake (Skowhegan, ME),” 2020, 4:44 minutes Courtesy of CMCA
Center for Maine Contemporary Art
21 Winter St., Rockland, cmcanow.org; 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday and noon to 5 p.m. Sunday, starting July 1; free admission for members, $5 for others throughout July, private tours for up to four people with CMCA executive director Suzette McAvoy by reservation from 10-11 a.m. daily, with donation of $25 per one to two people; masks and 6-feet distance between groups required, visitors limited to 15 at a time.
CMCA will have two exhibitions on display. “Skirting the Line: Painting between Abstraction and Representation” showcases five Maine-based contemporary painters: Meghan Brady, Inka Essenhigh, Tracy Miller, Anne Neely and Hanna Secord Wade. “Erin Johnson: Unnamed for Decades” is a two-gallery installation combining video, sculpture and photographs to explore the artist’s interest in “wide-ranging consequences of scientific research, as well as dissidence, desire, and the queer body.”
Farnsworth Art Museum
16 Museum St., Rockland, farnsworthmuseum.org; 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday through Monday; free admission for members, Rockland residents and children 16 and under, $10 for students 17 and older, $13 for seniors, $15 for adults; must purchase timed tickets in advance; face coverings, 6-feet distance between groups and following the one-way path required; hand sanitizer stations set up throughout museum.
The exhibitions that will be on view are “Maine: The Farnsworth Collection,” which celebrates the museum’s 70th anniversary; “Andrew Wyeth: Maine Legacy,” showcasing Wyeth’s art as he captured Maine between the 1920s and 2008; “Eliot Porter: All The Wild Places,” which includes Porter’s introduction of color into the landscape photography of Maine where the artist spent his summers; “Transforming The Ordinary: Women in American Book Cover Design,” which draws from the Farnsworth Library’s collection to display book cover designs from the 1890s through the 1930s; and “At Home in New England,” exploring the changing understanding of home in New England before COVID-19.
Monhegan Museum of Art & History
1 Lighthouse Hill, Monhegan, monheganmuseum.org; 1-3 p.m. daily, starting July 1; $5 for general admission, encouraged to reserve a timed ticket prior to arrival, face coverings and 6-feet distance between parties required, must follow marked route along gallery floor, will collect name and contact information for each visitor for contact tracing.
Due to an inability to maintain social distancing in the Kent-Fitzgerald buildings, for the first time since 2004, Fitzgerald studio hours will not be held this summer. In the gallery, only five visitors are allowed inside at a time. The Art Gallery and Ice Cutting exhibitions will be open. The art exhibition is entitled “Wintering Over: Year-round in Maine” and celebrates the state of Maine’s bicentennial.
Kathleen Speranza, “Wedding Flowers (For Marriage Equality),” 2015, Oil on panel Courtesy of Rena Nathanson
Ogunquit Museum of Art
543 Shore Road, Ogunquit, ogunquitmuseum.org; 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily, starting July 1; free admission for members and children under 12, $10 for students over 12 and seniors over 60, $12 for adults; open for seniors and vulnerable populations 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Wednesdays, increased cleaning and social distancing measures, face coverings required.
The Ogunquit Museum of Art currently has six exhibits open for viewing, including “After Party: Andy Rosen,” an installation comparing the present-day Ogunquit to the Ogunquit art colony of the 20th century through art inspired by surrounding nature; “Vanitas Vita: Kathleen Speranza” with paintings and drawings of florals; and “Nocturne: Emily Nelligan,” showcasing charcoal drawings. The other exhibits are “The View From Narrow Cove,” which celebrates Maine’s bicentennial and the museum’s 67th season, as well as reinstalling the museum’s permanent collection highlighting the work of Ogunquit Art Colony’s “founding father” Charles Woodbury and the influence of his students on American art; “Charles Woodbury: Open Studio,” which reimagines Woodbury’s studio as it might have appeared in the 1890s and uses artifacts, paintings, drawings, photographs and more from the artist’s studio that overlooked Perkins Cove; and “Light Southerly: Henry Strater in Verde Valley,” which explores the art of the museum’s founder, during his time in Arizona between 1931 and 1938.
The museum is permitted to allow five visitors in a gallery at once. Guests are encouraged to explore the grounds and sculpture gardens.
Portland Museum of Art
7 Congress Square, Portland, portlandmuseum.org; 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Wednesday (members only 4-6 p.m.), Thursday, Saturday and Sunday; 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Friday (senior hours 10 a.m. to noon); free admission through July 5, masks and social distancing required, must purchase timed-entry ticket.
The PMA will have two exhibitions open in addition to its permanent collection. Carrie Moyer & Sheila Pepe’s “Tabernacles for Trying Times,” which reimagines the tabernacle as a symbolic location and space for dialogue, and “James Welling: Seascape,” a color film showing scenes of the Maine coastline with an original sound composition.
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