Events

Summer 2025 Events

September 13th:

Maine Open Lighthouse Day

Art, Ecology, and the Resilience of a Maine Island: The Monhegan Wildlands Lecture and Workshop Series

In conjunction with the exhibition The Monhegan Wildlands: Art, Ecology, and the Resilience of a Maine Island, the Monhegan Museum of Art & History is collaborating with the Monhegan Associates, Inc. land trust to present an exciting series of lectures and workshops this coming summer. Inspired by the exhibit’s topics, materials, and themes, this lecture series invites people to deepen their understanding of the cultural, ecological, and artistic history of Monhegan Island. Below is a list of our guest speakers and workshop leaders. This season’s lecture series has been generously sponsored by the Monhegan House.

Thursday August 14th:

“A Dynamic Niche: Monhegan Modernism and Island Ecology“

Annual Edward L. Deci Endowed Lecture

Alan Braddock, Department Chair, Ralph H. Wark Professor of Art History, Environmental Humanities, and American Studies, College of William & Mary

7:30pm: Monhegan Schoolhouse, suggested donation = $10

Thursday September 11th:

Scratching the Surface: sampling the Monhegan woodlands

Barbara Putnam

Monhegan’s tranquility belies the many changes that have occurred on this dynamic island. This workshop focuses on the high contrast medium of scratchboard as a new way to think about observation. Following a guided walk on the trails recording notes in words, sketchpad, and camera, we will head back to the lighthouse and transfer our work. Scratchboard is a layered surface consisting of chalk on masonite, covered with a fine layer of black India ink. It offers the artist a unique approach to drawing: shaped tools scratch the black ink to reveal white rather than traditional drawing in which marks of black are drawn on white paper. This simple “reverse” helps us to see detail, texture and light with fresh eyes, exploring the medium’s signature characteristics of high contrast and endless grays.

Materials to bring: Pencils/pens eraser, small moleskin book or other means of drawing or sketching and writing. Your cell phone /camera, maybe even a macro lens if you have one.

We will provide scratchboard and tools, and an atmosphere where everyone will learn something new.

9:00 am – 1:00 pm on Lighthouse Hill

Registration information coming soon!