Hi everyone,
I am happy to introduce our new series for our next three newsletters! For the next few weeks, me and the other summer interns at Lights Out will be ‘taking over’ the newsletter to chat about our own experiences working at Lights Out. I’m Henry, one of the two design interns and a rising senior at Bowdoin studying Visual Arts and English. I’ve spent most of my time at Lights Out working on the website and designs for new events, alongside taking video of our operations for content coming later. My favorite project so far has been working on can designs for the beers we are creating with Norway Brewing Company— it’s helped me hone in on my collaboration skills while being loads of fun! I’ve had a great time getting to know Lights Out as a community; being here has taught me a lot about the nuts and bolts of running an arts organization and how to contribute to that every day. It’s been amazing to see Norway as well, the nature out here is spectacular and I’ve loved exploring the rivers and mountains surrounding it.
But that’s enough about me— onto events we want you to know about happening this week:
By Reed McLeen
Affection is a kind of bulging outwards
Rose Marasco’s show at the Jewish museum spans years of work, plus new intaglio impressions of pieces from recent years. The most exciting though, since most of the show I’ve seen before, are the ones done recently. First, they are images of birds resting where birds might rest. Postcard images of birds perched on rocks, nestled into windowsills, wedged between tree branches.
What is that bulging out of her pictures? It isn’t simply the postcard warped between points of contact, this feeling extends to the full plane — look at the sill of the window — it is the lens itself. Marasco makes us aware of the malleable quality of the lens, or actually, reality being bent by the lens; that it morphs and creates images rather than revealing objective reality. Her photos never feel like straightforward representation. This bulging is the instinctive response of an artist whose medium is indistinguishable from her agency. This is a long way of saying Marasco makes pictures that come towards you. This same bulging quality you feel when your heartbeat quickens. A little image of a bird bulging outward. Now think of flight, imagine the bird flying; how it feels to fly, to fall. Acceleration feels like a kind of bulging in the stomach.
Marasco never said any of this. She works “purely by instinct.” It just happens heart and mind are measured equally in her actions. Here, through familiarity with her lifelong medium, she wills still images to move by force.
The most interesting house in maine
Many have said that Ackerman and Weinberg — their work shares many similarities — are the same artist in two bodies: one more disposed to painting and the other to sculpture, like fraternal twins. They are partnered and within each other’s worlds, so none of this should be surprising.
Weinberg’s work is distinctly informed by interiors and the domestic. If that statement would indicate plainness, It is worth mentioning that their house is a preservationist’s cottage fantasy. Scraps of cracked wallpaper, plastic chandeliers — once a bargain option for a rural homestead, now a collector’s item — and antique bronzes are given equal weight. No design magazine would profile this house, and that is because it is more interesting, more rich and textured than anyone who reads those magazines. It is this background we find in Weinberg’s paintings. Lightswitches are repeated in series, serving to highlight the ephemeral: changing light, shifting patches of sun through a window warming a wallpaper scene of bucolic tree and pasture. The best of these paintings are glittering and lush with color without being garish. Moments of eerie whimsy intrude here too, a moth silently floating into a window, as a forest sprouts up from the wooden floor in an exquisitely painted room. They are lush, brainy, and patient. Full of dreams and illusions.
Fantasy doesn’t need to mean escape
There is one painting that isn’t brushy, looks tight, more planned, much more vibrant. The other paintings are all tinted with white, with imagery that seems discovered in the act of painting. This one feels condensed and it is apt as a cabinet, like the spot where artifacts from all the other paintings are collected. Other worlds are arranged here with more finality than their native lands.
Jeffrey’s work is genre-bending, a kind of simulation which includes sci-fi, fantasy, ancient history, and references from scripture. All of this can be called fantasy if we think of fantasy not as a literary genre but the capacity to imagine things, ourselves, as different from what they, we, actually are. They seem totally beyond rigid principles in painting, which is what makes them genuinely fun. Considering his innocent, slightly (or more than slightly) nerdy intelligence, they give the impression of someone living in his paintings, although not entirely vicariously. His sculptures are notable. Some of them are cracked, but it doesn’t matter much. They seem to implicate history, so it is no problem to see cracks in the foundation. They are sculpted from porcelain and terracotta deliberately, delicately, with not just a little sensuality. They are practically erotic. They induce imaginary adventures within their architecture: little rodent beings carrying torches on some obscure but very important quest.
When first meeting Ackerman and Weinberg, they jokingly referred to themselves as the “greying avant-garde.” Really, they remain consistently two of the most fantastically inclined artists in Maine.
Maine-based photographer & professor Emeritus Rose Marasco is launching a new scholarship dedicated to the visual arts! As a longtime resident of the state, Marasco was inspired to create the scholarship because of the role that scholarships played in her own ability to pursue art school. The scholarship is the only one of its kind in the state of Maine and is designed to support all visual arts students regardless of medium. Our curator, Reed Mclean, wanted to express his support for the scholarship:
“When Karlë Woods and I graduated high school, we were extremely lucky to be the final recipients of the Pearl Starbird Scholarship, a fund remarkably similar to the one Rose has launched. It granted us both a life changing amount of money, allowing us to pursue arts education without massive debt. For this we will both be forever grateful. This scholarship fills a void that has been missing in Maine since our own educations. We are both so proud of Rose, and know this fund will be transformative for those it supports.”
— Reed McLean, Curator
Our Studio Incubator highlight for this week is Carol Marsh, a ceramicist. Marsh began working with clay in when she was in her early twenties, then later became an architect, and found her way back to clay a year and a half ago. Major sources of inspiration for Marsh include the physical forms of living things, as well as how the relationship between time, space, and perspective can change the objects she creates. As a part of Lights Out’s studio incubator program, Marsh is creating ceramic sculptures in our shared studio alongside several other artists. When reflecting on her time at Lights Out, Marsh said she felt a strong sense of inspiration from the sense of community in the shared studio. Alongside the community aspect, she also mentioned that the ability to go back to the same place everyday gave her a more intimate relationship to her process of creating art.
The studio incubator program is made possible by support from the Maine Arts Commission, the Onion Foundation, and donations from folks like you!
Set at a former industrial cannery on the banks of Lake Pennesseewassee in Norway, Maine, Penn Landing sits on six acres of waterfront overlooking Ordway Grove, home to Maine’s largest white pines. The concert will take place in the center of a site-specific art installation built inside the space. More details on the full experience are coming soon, but trust us – you’re going to want to be there.
Wednesday evenings Long Pose, 5-8 pm with Haid Tanous. Same model, same pose for 6 weeks. Admission is $12 and will be held upstairs in the Dance Studio.
Wednesdays from 10 am-2 pm, free luncheon at 1 pm. Come volunteer at Lights Out and help us with a variety of fun projects. Georgia makes a delicious meal every week!
Join our Community Art Night every Sunday from 2-5 pm at Lights Out. With materials provided by Lights Out and donated by the community, we make sure you have what you need and are there to encourage your creativity and share in your excitement, whether we are engaging in a group project or you’re working solo. Come create!
Mark your calendars for this year’s arts festival in downtown Norway, Maine, happening Saturday, September 12th, 2026, from 10 am-4 pm
After the arts festival, Lady Lamb and Greg Jamie will be joining us at Penn Landing for a concert in partnership with SPACE. Saturday, September 12th, doors open at 6:00 pm and the concert starts at 7:00 pm.
Check out more upcoming events at Lights Out on our community calendar.
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