WILLOW CREEK — Easels sprouted along the banks of the Mattawamkeag River, on Main Street sidewalks, and at the edge of Homan’s Pond last weekend as 45 artists from Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts participated in Willow Creek’s first Plein Air Painting Weekend.
The three-day event, organized by the River Bend Gallery cooperative, invited artists to capture the town’s landscapes and architecture on canvas in real time, with the public invited to observe, ask questions, and purchase finished works.
“It was like the town itself became the gallery,” said Margaret Tremblay, who coordinated the event. “We had artists painting at 6 a.m. catching the mist on the river, and they were still going at dusk. The light up here is extraordinary.”
Artists registered for the event paid a $50 fee and were assigned to one of five designated painting zones across town. At the conclusion of each day, completed works were displayed at the Carnegie Library’s community room in a “wet paint” exhibition where 34 pieces sold, generating $6,800 in direct income for participating artists.
Doris Kim said the library saw an influx of visitors who came to watch the painters and stayed to browse the collection. “Art tourism is real,” Kim said. “People drove up from Bangor just to walk around and see the artists at work. That’s a new audience for us.”
The success has prompted discussions about making the event an annual tradition, possibly expanding to a weeklong format for the Ice-Out centennial in 2027.