ROCKLAND — Landing Gallery, in Rockland, opens “WILD LIFE,” a solo exhibition of new paintings by Sarah Faragher, May 24 – June 30. 

Meet and talk with Faragher at the Artist’s Opening Reception, Friday, June 7, from 5 to 8 p.m., during Arts In Rockland’s First Friday Art Walk. 

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. 

“When I began painting in and from the landscape over fifteen years ago, I worked outside about half the time,” said Faragher, in a news release. “Gradually I found myself painting more from direct observation and less in the studio, and now I make ninety-five percent of my paintings out in nature. The almanac of the year sets my schedule, and in working with the seasons, the weather, temperature, tides, and wind direction, I align myself with the natural order of things.

“Being out in the middle of everything as it unfolds helps reset my worry-clock to none, for long moments. I become more light of heart, and accepting of the inevitability of change, since working outside is to see and experience firsthand constant change, as the way of the world and everything in it.

“How necessary wildness is. What a gift and a treasure. I leave most human-made structures and objects out of my work for now, because I’m more compelled by landscapes and seascapes that are simply themselves, and by other creatures and species with their own wild character and integrity. When I’m outside I feel like one of them too. Making marks with a brush and paint, describing my perception of natural forms, while also evoking inner landscapes – what a deep searching happiness it is.

“Working this way helps me embrace and value the wild in myself. I remember who I am: a child of nature, a tree-hugger, a walker of quiet meadows and shorelines, a star-gazer and ocean-swimmer, a loafer and a worker bee, an observer and a participant in this life.  And after the pleasures of painting outside? I bring my new work home to the studio. The wild comes in, and I live with it, and listen to what it says. Part of which is this: representing nature is, to me, a radical and essential choice. Making that choice again and again results in the creation of elegies to the places I love, which are changing forever.

“I was born and raised in Downeast Maine. My paintings are memoirs of my experiences with nature. Through painting I participate in the landscape, recognize transcendent moments in nature, honor the integrity of natural forms, and describe where my heart lives.  I often feel as if the places I paint have commissioned me to tell their autobiographies, at the same time that I tell my own.” 

Gallery hours: Wed – Sat 11-5 and Sun 12-5, Closed Mon and Tue. 

FMI 207 239-1223, www.facebook.com/LandingGallery/