I employ action painting techniques where the dominant features are laid down in a free abstraction of actual place and position. Once the flurry and substance fluidity of an abstract base is present, I allow imagination and the forms that present themselves to tell me of how the scene will evolve. As increasing shapes of objects, colors and textures play out, I am constantly drawn into an ongoing evolution of place and texture in which I am but an observer. Brushes interrupt this process, rather than allowing the paint to dictate form; hence, I use no brushes, but work with torn shapes of lightweight cardboard, and at times, actual plant material to apply paint. The dynamic nature of the paint, in addition to utilizing organic materials, links me to the textural nature of real and imagined landscapes with a sense of place, volume and depth.

I work to create paintings where a viewer feels themselves present within the scene to a point where there is an actual unconscious desire or instinct to use all one’s senses, not just sight. I believe a naturally wild landscape is the greatest form of abstraction and as such it cannot be truly recreated or transferred as an image; it can only be captured in emotions it stirs within us.

In the summer of 1985, owner John Ames opened Gallery 68 in Belfast, Maine.  In combination with his gallery, a small press was installed and offered for artists to use. From 1985-88, Garde was to make the most frequent use of the press and produced over 300 monotypes and several dozen relief prints. His command of the process and his affinity to the spontaneity and freedom it offered resulted in an exceptional body of work.

In 1968 Garde became a professor, adjunct faculty Art Department at the Nassau Community College in Garden City, NY. He continued painting and exhibiting, and in 1971 in addition to the college teaching,  began full time art teaching in the secondary school system of Port Washington, N.Y.

In 1970 Garde had his first solo showing in Huntington, N.Y. and continued to exhibit regularly. In 1984 after retiring from teaching he moved to Belfast, Maine, with his second wife, the late writer, Barbara Kramer. Ten years later they bought a winter home in New Smyrna Beach, Florida where Garde continues to divide his time between home and studio in Maine and Florida.

“I have an abstract expressionist background. It was the most excitingly new development in art when I was a young painter. Much of that training remains. I am interested in what paint can do, making marks that expressively respond to my thoughts and actions. Now, although I rarely choose to allow the non-figurative (the ‘abstract’ of “abstract expressionism”) to remain as the final work. From this first non-figurative stage I will continue working until I find an image that becomes an identifiable subject. When I have decided on this image, then comes the careful exploring and developing needed to finalize each work, each with its own unique integrity.

Although I enjoyed my experiences with sophisticated techniques and equipment, I now want the simplest, the most direct, the most basic. I choose to work in acrylics because of the easy application when painting on paper or canvas. For more recent print-making I have developed and taught my dry image transfer “strappo” technique. I relish the effects I can create with the use of simple tools, acrylic paints and glass plates.

There are themes that recur in my work and often re-emerge as current challenges. Although an individual work must be a unique statement, I welcome a subject that invites a multitude of solutions. When that occurs, and I am concerned with a series, there is a helpful direction as I reach for a solution. A new and separate version can be an answer to the puzzle that is every painting. Looking for a new solution challenges and keeps me energized. The accumulation that results from these explorations can present me or viewers with a rewarding overview.

Over the years I have used as subjects the images of chairs, single and in groups. I have a pinnacle series, a series with still life references. There are some series have figures and faces, puppeteers and puppets. A group of recent work related to the “T” shape of the kimono. Such subjects, suitable for a series, attract me when they are generic, ones that are familiar, readily recognized, capable of being rendered with many variations. Whether they are presented subtly or boldly, small or large, fragile or monumental, I want my works to be visually exciting, capable of engaging the eye, the emotions and stimulating the mind of the viewer

When I was 8, I saw my mother receive a large, Navajo turquoise and silver squash blossom from Arizona. The beauty of the turquoise stone made a deep impression. Throughout my childhood, on hikes and trips to the beach, my eyes were always directed downward, ever in search of pretty rocks and shells.  For me they were jewels that the earth put in my path.

The souk in Nizwa (Oman) in the 80’s was just a large tent with many stalls. I loved strolling through it, bartering with the vendors and buying antique Bedouin silver jewelry. Later I did the same thing in Koforidua (Ghana), as I learned about old African glass, ancient stone beads, and antique European glass beads made for trade in Africa. Sitting at a table with Julio in Lima, I would barter in Spanish for hand cut semi-precious stones from Peru, spondylus from Ecuador, or amethysts from Brazil. My collector’s heart soared, just as it did when as a child I delighted in finding rocks or shells–jewels from the earth.

The beads that I use are all unique. They are either very old, handmade, well-traveled glass beads, or semi-precious hand cut beads from artisans in Third World Countries. I enjoy mixing contemporary tastes with ancient color combinations. When I design a piece, I try to combine a respect for classic designs and colors, with the taste of contemporary women.  Each piece is one of a kind, and my inspiration is usually based on a particular bead or color or form.  I also delight in remaking heirloom necklaces into something more updated.

I never repeat a design. Some of the Peruvian pieces are over 1000 years old. The Venetian trade beads are hundreds of years old. In addition to Venetian, there are Hebron, Bohemian, Dutch and African glass beads, all old, all traded, and all hand made.

By seeing and touching and wearing these creations, you will feel like you are stepping into a world of history, travel, and culture.

- Think of your necklace as a beautiful string of cultural history -

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To learn more about Maureen O’Keefe and her bead designs, visit her website at: www.jeweledhorizons.com

A native of Nova Scotia, Neville was born in Halls Harbour on the Bay of Fundy, to a family of boat builders and fishermen where hard work was taken for granted.  He grew up fishing with his father, building boats and listening to the tales of men and women in the local villages. There were stories about bootlegging, bad luck, record catches, rivalries and drunken husbands—all of which became the basis for his rich pictorial language.

At a young age Neville began drawing boats and other subjects on the backs of advertisement broadsheets that his grandfather, the village postmaster, gave him. In 1972 Neville left Halls Harbor to attend the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in Halifax where he studied photography and printmaking.  After graduating with a BFA in 1976 from the Centre Gravure de Contemporaine in Geneva, Switzerland, he returned to Halls Harbour to set up a printmaking studio.

In recent years, Neville brought the mark making of his etchings to the brush. His oil paintings are instantly recognizable by his drawing style and his bold use of color, and they continue to tell the tales of these bygone days by recording a rich folklore and a vanishing way of life with consistency and beauty.

Jenilyn Johnson, a Rockland native, grew up working with clay.  With a potter/sculptor for a father, she started her life’s work as a functional potter.  She branched out quickly from thrown pots to other sculptural forms while completing an undergraduate degree in studio art and a Master of Fine Arts degree in Ceramics at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Her interest in figurative sculpture developed in graduate school, when she started using a pinched-slab technique to build her signature terra cotta figures. The grouping of 21 figures called “Crowd Composition,” is an exploration of relationships-not only among the figures in the group, but between the sculptures and their viewer. “All those figures are looking out and responding to the viewer. It’s not passive. The figures look back at you and create a dialogue,” Johnson says.

Johnson’s powerfully evocative figures, sculpted from clay and porcelain, range from one to three feet tall, and unfailingly elicit a strong emotional response in their viewers. “What I try to do with my figures is describe feelings and emotions that are hard to express in words,” Johnson says.

“Jenilyn Johnson’s terra cotta figures are reminiscent of the armies of warriors unearthed within the Great Wall of China-though hers are soldiers of another sort, soldiers of the heart,” says Harbor Square Gallery founder Thomas O’Donovan. “It has been said that we humans are not physical beings having spiritual experiences, but rather spirits inhabiting the world of material, quite literally becoming clay.”

Nearly all of her figures are created to be deliberately gender-neutral. “That allows the viewer to give the figures meaning without being informed by gender-the pieces are purely form and expression.”she says. She frequently works with more than one figure, often creating couples or trios. “People create a story about what they’re seeing,” Johnson says. “Within that story, I like to explore the relationships between the individual figures in the group.”

Jenilyn currently lives and works in Rockland, Maine.

I began painting in Maine in the mid 70′s. With a group of artist friends, I came for summers of painting the Maine landscape. The trips would focus on Maine’s rocky coast and its many islands. I relocated to Maine in 1984 with my wife Susan and our two daughters Jeannette and Julia.

I have shown my work in galleries in New York, California, Florida, North Carolina, and Maine. I was the subject of a feature article in the May, 1995 issue of American Artist Magazine.

Currently, I am working on paintings done in and around Cape Elizabeth. I am a contemporary realist painter and draw my inspiration from those places and things close to me. I teach and paint out of my studio in Portland, Maine.

I am represented in The Portland Museum Art (The Elizabeth Noyce Collection) and in many private and corporate collections throughout the U.S. and abroad.

I have developed two distinct styles. The first is classic and symmetrical, using traditional design motifs and reminiscent of ancient jewelry.

I sketch designs first and then at the workbench pursue an organic approach, allowing the designs to grow and evolve spontaneously. My work is based on the concepts of durability and quality for daily wear as well as formal occasions.

With the pressing issues of environmental concerns, my intent is that both the wearer and the viewer will be reminded of the beauty and fragility of our planet. I wish to raise consciousness and dignity to these issues, with tributes preserved in the permanence of noble metal and gemstones, two of earth’s most enduring materials.

All pieces are 18k gold or 950 platinum. All diamonds are E-F color and VS-1 clarity or better. I select only the finest gemstones of superb cut.