At this time last year, Henry Isaacs had no idea he would spend the winter living on Little Cranberry Island. Thanks to his wife, Donna, who accepted a teaching position at the Islesford Elementary School last August, Henry is doing something he always wanted to do.
Henry’s studio, originally built for summer use, is just a few hundred steps away from his house. When I stopped by, he was working on a series of oil paintings of the view from Gilley Beach. One of the paintings would be traded for a cord of wood from Cory Duggan. As his coagulated brushes warmed up by the feeble fire in his wood stove, Henry commented on the changes in his business. With 90 percent of his commissioned work canceled due to the economy, he is once again working on paintings of a smaller scale and working on a consignment basis.
He likes the chance to barter with his neighbors, and he is very happy to be part of the island winter community. When planning a painting, Henry takes several canvases to the site to make sketches. He will finish the canvases back in his studio, using the sketches and notes. He finds that working from photographs gets in the way of remembering the colors, as he saw them. I asked Henry if he minded having people stop to watch him work. He said, “Remember the story of Mike Mulligan and his steam shovel? As they dug the cellar for the new town hall, more and more people came by to watch. The more people cheered the faster they dug. If you’re going to paint outside in front of everyone, you have to adopt that philosophy.”
My neighbor, Rick Alley, is both a lobster fisherman and an artist. He grew up on Islesford, attended Lee Academy, and graduated from the Portland School of Art in 1973. When winter arrives, we usually ask each other, “Is your studio cleaned up yet? Are you getting to work?” He admitted a month ago that he needed to move his fish trap before he could get back to painting. By early March, the fish trap was a neat pile of netting in the middle of his workshop floor. Hanging on three walls were tidy rows of duck decoys separated into groups of bluebills, white-wing sco0ters, and red-breasted mergansers. Orange and white buoys hung, freshly painted, from the low ceiling. At the other end of the workshop is Rick’s painting studio, where he put the finishing touches on a striking scene of a male and female mallard duck at the snowy edge of a salt marsh. He will submit the painting to the State of Maine Duck Stamp competition to be judged the first week in April. Though he prefers to paint on canvas, Rick paints on Masonite for the competition. The smooth background helps him achieve the sharp edges he needs for a piece of art that, if it wins, will be reduced to the size of a stamp. Rick won the state’s first competition in 1988 and has won since with paintings of black ducks, white-winged scooters, buffle heads, long tail ducks, and Barrow’s golden eye.
Kaitlyn Duggan has been a potter at the Islesford Pottery shop for the past three summers. This year she and husband Cory Duggan decided to stay for the winter. Her search for winter studio space ended when sculptor, Philip Grausman offered to let her use his summer studio on the island. Kaitlyn and her beautiful work add to the good energy of the space. Even on a cloudy day, the spacious studio is bright with natural light from six skylights.
Kaitlyn has just finished an order for ten place settings of a three-piece dinnerware set. Two sets of canisters, from a wedding registry, await firing in her kiln. Her richly colored designs are inspired by plants, vegetables and flowers. Lately, instead of trying out new motifs, her creativity comes from trying new forms. “The form inspires the surface design.” This winter she has added elongated knobs for hanging clothes or towels, bowl sets in three graduated sizes, and ceramic buttons to her colorful collection. This winter, Kaitlyn also established a new outlet for her work. She developed her own shopping site on Etsy, a web site for buying and selling handmade items. One can see her work by going to www.kaitlyndugganstudio.etsy.com.
Islesford Fire Chief, Courtney Chaplin, is an island carpenter who has worked in the building trade for over 20 years. In the last three years Courtney has been designing and making furniture and bowls from blown-down trees on the island. He uses mostly red spruce, because of its abundance and the beauty of the grain.
Courtney has kept a notebook of ideas for the last 10 years, but 80 percent of his ideas come from the piece of wood that’s in front of him. “Grain means everything.” He has an artist’s mind with an architect’s training. Courtney’s signature work utilizes the natural curve of the trunk near the root, known as the knee. This is a nod to wooden ship builders who used knees to strengthen and support deck beams and keels, and to get the most use out of a single tree. It is no wonder that Courtney’s favorite wood comes from the hackmatack (tamarack) tree, whose shallow roots grow almost perpendicular to its trunk. His shop is crowded with work in various stages; three-legged and two-legged tables and stools, hand-carved salad bowls, door panels made from the burl of a tree to house a spice rack inside, and wood that is waiting to “say” something. Courtney works on these pieces at night, on weekends, and during bad weather. He is currently finishing a custom order for a dining room table and four bowls. Several of his pieces will be featured in a new island gallery this summer.
Creativity is alive and well this winter on Little Cranberry Island. As a jeweler with my own studio, these tours revived my energy and inspired me to get back to my own winter’s work.