In a former Norway snowshoe factory, an arts hub is taking shape

A nonprofit is working to transform the large building into a multi-use space called Lights Out Gallery.

“NORWAY – Downstairs, three volunteers were installing insulation. In a future gallery, two more were helping Pamela Moulton paint a sculpture made out of discarded fishing gear. In an office, Anne Stuer was cataloging video interviews of Maine artists while Daniel Sipe and Reed McLean worked on fundraising postcards. Upstairs, two people were getting ready to install speakers in a soon-to-be dance studio. Later, Georgia Ryan would heat a big pot of turkey mole for a shared lunch…”

– Megan Gray, Portland Press Herald

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The Movement of Our Irregular Spirits

Reed McLean / Maine Arts Journal / Winter 2024

Before our eyes open there are dreams in which we first see the world not as it truly is, but as we imagine it to be. By these passing lights and shadows we conceive the many games of our lives.

As a child I woke and ran out into the morning yard to gather the lights of the dew on the grass as so many gems scattered by some traveler passing in the night. I explored the location of the hidden jewels but could not locate their gleam. I found only dampness. The illusion of treasure faded but would return many times in other forms as fugitive and mutable as the light itself.

It is in the character of play to wander. Children bored with the rules of their games invent others and outgrow their toys for serious industries. By whatever shrewdness responsible we find our lives speeding in directions no one can predict. The sparkling company of play will follow us if we are lucky or able to conjure it. But there are times when play abandons us at school or on the job and labor takes on dimensionless weight and leaves us with the unendurable drudgery of daily life. On these occasions we may easily become traitors to our own dreams. Any discipline we can muster remains unfruitful and our halfhearted endeavors are meekly diagnosed as “good enough.” But even at these moments when we are lost and confused, overcome by shifting nausea, the trickster play is hiding and waiting for the right moment to lighten our burdens.

I went to bed late in the early hours of the morning in the weeds with a deadline looming. I was hopelessly struggling to finish a video interview showcasing the artist Barbara Sullivan. Nothing was working. Near a state of panic, I barely slept. In a stream of half-consciousness I dreamt repetitively of the same memory, a road trip with my aunt where we listened to nothing but Patsy Cline. I awoke before dawn with her world-weary voice in my head singing “Crazy, I’m crazy for feeling so lonely.” I went straight to the computer and began rapidly sifting through Cline’s discography, grabbing at any title or detail that caught my interest. An hour passed, then two. I grew more and more agitated by a need for an elusive quality to hold the video together whose parts I had failed to reconcile. I moved through my list methodically, disqualifying each selection. I didn’t feel convinced by any of them....

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Barbara Sullivan

Barbara Sullivan is a painter and installation artist living in Maine. She works in the age–old medium of fresco, which she learned when she was the head cook at The Skowhegan School of Sculpture and Painting. Her relationship to the Maine art community is long and involved. She is represented by Caldbeck Gallery in Rockland, ME.

"I make bas-relief fresco objects that are effigies of real things; distorting and flattening both the forms and the painted surfaces allows the viewer to question their perception of perspective. Historically, fresco as a medium was used to paint illusionistic images on flat architectural surfaces. My objects are life -sized to reflect the scale of fresco murals. I consider, each object as a vocabulary component, either to stand separately or to be grouped together in a narrative using the wall as a ground."

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