Colors of Maine

Here is a selection of the gallery's premier watercolors
depicting the many wonderful moods of the Maine Coast.

Just scroll down to see each painting.

Carl Gordon Cutler (1873-1945)

“Near the Artist’s Cottage”

Watercolor on paper, 19.5x 24.5”

$1800

Carl Gordon Cutler was born in 1873 in Massachusetts. Though educated in the painting of portraits in oil, his two major artistic passions would become the landscape of Maine and the use of watercolor. His watercolors, influenced by Fauve color and John Marin's forms, were exhibited in Europe and the eastern United States, in Boston; Philadelphia; the Museum of Modern Art, and Whitney Museum of American Art, both in New York City; and, farther west, at the Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois; as well as Paris, France. Cutler had more than a dozen one-man shows in New York City and Boston.

Cutler studied in the late 1890s at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where influence of the old masters on the painting of oil portraits was strong. He also worked at the Academie Julian in Paris. Cutler had some exhibition success there, but it would take several years after his return to America before his mature style would appear. Cutler first painted the Maine coast soon after the Armory Show. By the mid-1920s, he was painting watercolors of the state's landscape exclusivelyviews of Deer Isle, Mount Desert, the Camden Hills and--for thirty summers, Eggemoggin Reach, where Cutler had a cottage. The artist received the plaudits of the critics and acclaim from the public. He spent the last 30 years of his career focusing entirely on painting Maine's Penobscot Bay region.

Carl Cutler was a respected color theorist. In his 1923 book Modern Color, with Stephen C. Pepper, he explained a detailed system involving a scale of 168 colors, telling how to imitate the appearance of natural light through their use. He also discussed emotion as a significant element in artistic creation. In 1994, the Vose Gallery, in Boston, put out a color brochure, Carl Gordon Cutler Along the Maine Coast 1873-1945. Also in the 1990s, the Babcock Gallery, in New York City, published Carl Gordon Cutler, American Modernist Rediscovered, a paperback with forty-four color reproductions and an essay. In 1998, the Portland Museum of Art, in Maine, held an exhibition, "Modern Color": Maine Watercolors by Carl Gordon Cutler, comprised of sixteen out of a total of fifty-nine Cutler watercolors bequeathed a year earlier to the Museum by Mr. and Mrs. James E. Haas. Also in 1998, the College of the Atlantic, Bar Harbor, Maine, exhibited fourteen of Cutler's Maine coastal landscapes painted in the South Brooksville area on the Blue Hill Peninsula.

Carl Gordon Cutler (1873-1945)

“Pink Rocks”

Watercolor on paper, 19.5x 24.5”

$1800

Carl Gordon Cutler (1873-1945)

“Looking South” Brooklin, Maine

Watercolor on paper, 16.5x 24.5”

Framed 30 x 37 in$2800

Elwyn George Gowen 1895-1954

Cabin in the Mountains

watercolor 5 1/2 x 9 in

estate stamped signature

$250

Elwyn George Gowen 1895-1954

Roadside Farm

watercolor 5 1/2 x 9 in

estate stamped signature

$250

Nathaniel Dirk (1895-1961)

Boat on the Ways, c.1937. Watercolor.

Image size 8 x 10, mat size 13 x 15

Condition: excellent with vibrant colors on heavy watercolor paper.

$900

Nathaniel Dirk studied at the Art Students League with Max Weber and Kenneth Hayes Miller and in Paris with Fernand Leger. Beginning in 1939 he taught at the League and lectured there on "Color for the Artist" from 1957 through 1960. He was president of the Cape Ann Society of Modern Art and a member of the Rockport Art Association. He exhibited widely, with thirteen one-man shows in New York City alone. Primarily known as a watercolorist, painting in a style similar to, but not as abstract, as that of John Marin. His work is represented in the collections of the Smithsonian, the Brooklyn Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the National Academy of Design and the Art Institute of Chicago.

(From: Pam Koob, Curator, The Art Students League of New York)

Nathaniel Dirk (1895-1961)

Summer Sails, c.1937. Watercolor.

Image size 8 x 10, mat size 11 x 14

$900

Henry Martin Gasser (1909-1981)

Coastal Scene

Watercolor on paper, 12x 15”

$1800

Painter, lecturer, teacher, illustrator and author, Henry Gasser was born in Newark, New Jersey on Oct. 31,1909. He lived, studied and worked in New Jersey for his entire life. A Master at watercolor and oil his work consisted of, in his own words, "everyday subjects that are available to most of us-street scenes, back yards, trees, old houses, etc I looked for them in front of houses, in backyards, public parks, and elsewhere". He also painted numerous harbor and fishing village scenes. His work demonstrated a sense of place and feeling that most could identify with. He often "exhausted a subject" which becomes evident when viewing the body of his work for many of his paintings are just slight variations of previously completed compositions. His Paintings also contain a great deal of what he called "solitary silence" created by chosen subject matter such as a "Coming Storm", "Night in the Park", "Shadows"... He felt that Design was very important and meant the difference between a mediocre work and a truly professional one. It is here where Gasser excelled, his work demonstrates a sense of composition that gained wide spread appreciation for his work.

He got his background in art studying at the Newark School of Fine and Industrial Art and the Grand Central School of Art. This was followed by study at the Art Students League of New York in the classes of Robert Bracman. He later studied privately under John R. Grabach. He is represented in over fifty museum collections and numerous important private ones as well. Among the awards that Henry Gasser has received are the Hallgarten Prize at the National Academy, the Zabriskie, Osborne, and Obrig prizes at the American Watercolor Society, the Philadelphia watercolor club prize, the Allied Artists Gold Medal at Oakland, California and many others. He was a member of the National academy of Design, the American Watercolor Society, the Royal Society of Art (Great Britain), the Salmagundi Club, the Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington Watercolor Clubs and the New Jersey Watercolor Society. He was a life member of the National Arts Club, Grand Central Art Galleries and the Art Students League and others. He served as Director of the Newark School of Fine and Industrial Art from 1946-54 then continued lecturing and demonstrating for most of the remainder of his life. He also wrote numerous books on painting. He died in Orange, NJ in 1981.