Get Out and Enjoy Maine

With warm weather on the way and summer vacations to follow, there’s lots to do if you feel yourself developing a case of spring fever.

This coming Saturday, May 18, is Community Day at the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath. The day features free admission, discounted cruises , activities and lawn games. At noon, members of the community will raise flags over the Wyoming evocation, complete with a bell salute. The Merrymeeting will be offering narrated tours past Bath Iron Works and Doubling Point lighthouse. There will also be tours of the Percy & Small Shipyard and the opening of the Victorian Donnell House.

The following week on Thursday, May 23, the Penobscot Marine Museum holds its opening reception for the season from 4 to 6 p.m. The opening includes a sea chanty singalong as well as a showcase of the museum’s 2024 exhibits and its core offerings.

This year’s schedule includes Saturday Music Sessions from May 25 to October 5, featuring local muscians, and Teen Club Wednesday for youngsters ages 12 to 18.

According to the musum’ newsletter exhibits on tap for the summer include “Music in Our Lives,” exploring the work of Joanna Colcord and the role of work songs and musical instruments as an indicator of the culture within communities. “If you Give a Girl a Camera” features the photography of Colcord and Ruth Montgomery as they document their voyages at sea between 1899 and 1900. And, “Faithfully Yours, Joanna C. Colcord” further delves into Colcord’s life as, “photographer, author, sailor, social worker, director, teacher, linguist, chemist, world traveler. Born at sea in 1882, Joanna Colcord led a full, dedicated, and exciting life. She split her childhood between the small Maine seacoast village of Searsport and traveling the world on her father’s merchant vessel.”

New core exhibits at the museum include, “Powering Up: The Evolution of the Maine Lobster Boat” and the Jim Steele Peapod Shop.

 Barbara Prey Projects in Port Clyde will offer three distinct exhibits this summer. The water color artist's work will be featured in “Abstracting from Nature," opeing July 1; “Wonder,” which opens July 15; and “An American Way of Seeing: Prey and Hopper,” opening August 12. 

The Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland has a big summer planned with three exhibitions covering artists, local histories and never-before-seen works.

“Lynn Drexler: Color Notes,” open now and running until January 12, 2025, features the artist’s work in the 1960s. The museum is the largest collection holder of Drexler’s work and the show will include loans from other institutions and private collectors.

“Mag-win’-teg-wak: A Legacy of Penobscot Basketry,” also open now through January 5, 2025, explores the work of Penobscot basketmaker and tribal advocate Robert s. Anderson (1929-2020). Says the museum, “Referred to as mag-win’-teg-wak, or “a place of choppy seas” in the Penobscot language, the Shay and Anderson families operated a business on Lincolnville Beach in Maine for almost 70 years and created a marketplace and thriving community for Wabanaki basketmakers. This exhibition traces the rise of the family business, as well as their own basketmaking practices, and it showcases extraordinary examples of Penobscot basketry styles and traditions from the 1930s to today.”

Opening July 4 and running until September 29, “Jamie Wyeth: Unsettled,” looks at intriguing and often disconcerting images over the career of the artist, who was born in 1946. Among the goals of the exhibition, according to the gallery, is the separation of his works from that of other family members. In a release, the museum notes, “Not intended as a retrospective, the exhibition will follow the development of Wyeth’s skillful, cinematic shorthand, which has the power to create a sense of anxiety in the viewer. A focused look at Wyeth’s arresting, visceral imagery will provide fascinating insight into the artist and the art of visual storytelling. Fiercely independent in the face of prevailing art world trends, Jamie Wyeth stands apart in a shadowy and strange world of his own creation."

Here's our recommendation: Get out and take it all in!