Extraordinary Earth
In the spirit of Earth Day, The Kittery Art Association honors the planet that we call home. Celebrate this gorgeous, vast, textural blue and green planet. We are in a universe of wonders - from the micro to macro lens.
In conjunction to the Extraordinary Earth exhibit, we are pleased to present a display of artwork from our ceramic artists.
Also On View: Works by Spotlight Artist Terrence Chick
Opening Reception: Friday, April 12th from 5-7pm.
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, April 8th from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please read our 2024 All Member Exhibit submission guidelines and download your artist contract here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/submission-guidelines
We will also be presenting a special collection of work from ceramics artists in our membership. Are you a KAA Exhibiting Member and Ceramic Artist who would like to learn more and register for this display? Please find more information and submit you registration here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/ceramics2024
Note to KAA Exhibiting Members: Let’s celebrate Earth with art inspired by our home planet. This can also include artwork made with repurposed or recycled materials.
K-12 Student Art Show: The Kittery School System
Join us to celebrate emerging young artists in our community from May 16th through May 26th at The Kittery Art Association! The Annual K-12 Student Art Show highlights the work of students within the Kittery School System. This show features work from students of Mitchell, Shapleigh, and Traip Academy.
Opening Reception: Thursday, May 16th from 3:30-5:00pm.
Mixed Up
The process of creating artwork is tactile and sometimes requires unwavering exploration. The Kittery Art Association presents “Mixed Up” - a mixed media exhibit, from June 6th through July 7th.
Also On View: Works by Spotlight Artist Maggie Sanftleben
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, June 3rd from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please read our 2024 All Member Exhibit submission guidelines and download your artist contract here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/submission-guidelines
Through The Lens: Photography Show
Through the camera’s lens. Through mirrors and tricks of the light. Through stark realities and instantaneous wonders. Let’s focus on the photograph: June 6th - July 7th at The Kittery Art Association.
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, June 3rd from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please read our 2024 All Member Exhibit submission guidelines and download your artist contract here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/submission-guidelines
Note to KAA Exhibiting Members: All types of photo processing are welcome for this exhibit.
Travels And Trails
Travel the world and back again - It’s art on the move. Whether artists seek inspiration from adventures abroad or find their muse in their own backyard. Join us for Travels And Trails at the Kittery Art Association from July 11th through August 11th.
Also On View: Works by Spotlight Artist Jeanne Maguire
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, July 8th from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please read our 2024 All Member Exhibit submission guidelines and download your artist contract here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/submission-guidelines
Featured Artwork: Gabriel, by Jeanne Maguire.
Dawn Dusk Darkness
Dreams exist in nocturne, and a change in light ushers in a new perspective. The study of light is critical to artists, poets, and philosophers. There are spirits that awaken in the dawn, and as the light dims at the end of day. Join us for Dawn Dusk Darkness at The Kittery Art Association from August 15th to September 15th.
Also On View: Works by Spotlight Artist Bethany Peck
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, August 12th from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please read our 2024 All Member Exhibit submission guidelines and download your artist contract here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/submission-guidelines
Personal Favorites
Ego and creativity is often a jagged line. Join us, as we present a collection of our artists’ triumphs in Personal Favorites. September 19th through October 20th at The Kittery Art Association.
Also On View: Works by Spotlight Artist Jack Calabrese
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, September 16th from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please read our 2024 All Member Exhibit submission guidelines and download your artist contract here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/submission-guidelines
Enchanted Spaces
Secret gardens, hideaways, fantastic worlds, the wilderness - there is magic that surrounds us betwixt and between. From the depths of the deepest ocean to forgotten corners of our imagination. Enchanted Spaces is on view at the KAA from October 24th - November 24th, 2024.
Also On View: Works by Spotlight Artist Cynthia Mariano
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, October21st from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please read our 2024 All Member Exhibit submission guidelines and download your artist contract here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/submission-guidelines
Kittery Art Association Holiday Show & Gift Bazaar
Join us as we transform the gallery into the ultimate destination for fine art and one of a kind handmade gifts for everyone on your list! For the first time, The Kittery Art Association will be holding a sale of 10x10” unframed artwork in addition to our traditional artisan handmade gift bazaar.
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, November 25th from 2-6pm in the gallery.
Note to KAA Exhibiting Members: Hanging artwork submissions are limited to 10x10” unframed works on canvas. There is a two piece submission limit to hanging artwork.
Art Pick-Up: Monday, December 23rd from 2-6pm.
Kittery, Our Town
Join the Kittery Art Association in a celebration of our historic town. Kittery is the oldest incorporated town in Maine, and this beautiful seaside community is steeped in history. Our historic town has much to memorialize; rocky beaches, traditional architecture, historic defense structures, parks, and quiet private spaces. This is our ode to our home, the gateway to Maine.
Featured Artwork: Entrance Fort McClary, Watercolor, Marilyn Eimon.
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, March 4th from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please see additional notes below:
This is a special exhibition, and there is a one piece limit for each Exhibiting Member.
You are welcome to submit supplemental materials to be included in a binder that will be available in the exhibit.
Items submitted for this project must be printed on standard 8.5x11” copy paper, will remain in the KAA Archives after the show closes.
These materials may include submissions of prose, poetry, anecdotes, or artist statements that center around the town of Kittery. You may also submit reproductions or scans of photographs, or sketches that are also thematically appropriate.
Please feel free to email these materials to us at info@kitteryartassociation.org for a chance to have them featured on our website or social media accounts.
Don’t forget to include your name on these materials so that you may be properly credited.
Etchings: Mary Margaret Sweeney
It is with the greatest honor that we present a collection of etchings from the studio of Mary Margaret Sweeney, on view from March 7th through April 7th at The Kittery Art Association.
“Mary Margaret Sweeney uses the medium of etching in its best traditional manner. Proficient and sophisticated in technique, her prints have the poise and polish of the Old Masters or the Nineteenth Century Etching Revivalists. Indeed the artist confesses the influence of the prints of Childe Hassam. Like this 19th Century American Impressionist, Sweeney is continually inspired by the New England Landscape. With her eyes attuned to the linear vocabulary of etching she finds patterns everywhere in rocks, trees and uneven horizons. While many of her prints depict figures, still lifes, and interiors, she always returns to her favorite forested landscapes." - David Acton, Working Proof
Sweeney attended The Chicago Art Institute majoring in advertising and design, but only found printmaking when she returned to formal art training after raising her children. She graduated from the University of New Hampshire in 1980. In her three-decade career as a printmaker, she has been involved with the Experimental Etching Studio in Boston, The Boston Printmakers, The Society of American Graphic Artists in New York, The New Hampshire Art Association and The League of New Hampshire Craftsmen.
Her works have been exhibited nationally and internationally and are in the permanent collections of the New Hampshire Commission on the Arts, Boston Public Library, Worcester Art Museum, The Art Complex Museum in Duxbury, MA, and Framingham State College.
For many years Mary Margaret Sweeney worked from her Government Street studio, in the heart of Kittery Foreside. Many of her prints are Traditional Intaglio Printmaking, and her more recent works are Solar Plate Etchings which give the image a softer feel. The artist writes about her Traditional Intaglio process: “A printmaker draws through ground on a metal plate. The plate is immersed in an acid bath. Ink is applied to the plate and the excess is wiped away, leaving ink in the etched grooves. Dampened paper is laid on the plate and the plate and paper are run through a printing press. Note that the printed image appears in reverse.” To achieve her color prints the artist applies pigments to each print by hand, using colored pencils.
This exhibition and sale of Mary Margaret Sweeney’s etchings is made possible by Ali Goodwin, and with the generosity of the artist's family.
Start Fresh!
Each day holds the promise of new beginnings - a fresh start. As humans and as artists, we must embrace transitions and find inspiration; new processes, ideas, chemical reactions. All living things must accept that change is a beautiful part of existence. Join us for Start Fresh! from February 1st through March 3rd, 2024. Opening Reception: Friday, February 2nd from 5-7pm
Art Intake for Exhibiting Members: Monday, January 29th from 2-6pm in the gallery. Please read our 2024 All Member Exhibit submission guidelines and download your artist contract here: www.kitteryartassociation.org/submission-guidelines
Note to KAA Exhibiting Members: This show is all about starting fresh! What new processes, ideas, or inspirations have you been working with over the past few months?
Also On View: Works by Spotlight Artist Jane Zeeb-McDonnell
It took me years to feel comfortable calling myself an artist. I felt like I needed a degree to be legitimate. So I got one. I felt like I had to sell my art. So I sold some. But now I am comfortable just being who I am.
I am a creative person. That means I paint, I draw, I design things. I always feel my best when I am creating something and sharing it with others.
While I have worked in many mediums, I still find watercolor the most intriguing. I paint both plein air and in my studio. Both have their unique challenges and rewards. Plein air is raw and in the moment, influenced by the outdoor elements. Studio time offers the opportunity to play with the distinctive qualities of watercolor.
Being a watercolor artist for quite a few years now, I've collected quite a pile of unfinished or unsatisfying paintings. While not frame worthy, many of these paintings have some part to them that makes them worth saving.
Somehow I came up with the idea to cut up, or with the help of paper punches, cut out pieces of these old paintings and repositioning them onto other old paintings, creating a new, much more exciting version of the previous work.
Not quite being watercolor any more, nor traditional collage, I created the term reconstructed watercolor collage to describe both my process and the finished pieces.