Gleason Fine Art at 31 Townsend Ave. in Boothbay Harbor announces its September show: “Michael Vermette: The Monhegan Series,” which opens Friday, Sept. 18 with a reception from 5-7 p.m., runs through Oct. 27.

The morning after the reception, Michael and his students will take the ferry to Monhegan Island for a very special, 3-day painting and art history workshop on the island. In “The Monhegan Series,” Michael focuses on remote Monhegan Island, often called “the artists’ island.” Thirteen miles by ferry from Boothbay Harbor, the wild but approachable Monhegan promises the adventure of a lifetime for anyone who visits. But artists, including such renowned ones as Andrew and Jamie Wyeth, Edward Redfield, and George Bellows, have also fallen in love with the island. Michael has traveled to Monhegan Island many times, drawn by the same craggy cliffs, dramatic headlands, sun-dazzled white buildings, intense blue skies, and ever-changing seas that have attracted artists for decades.

Of the many artists who have experienced Monhegan, Vermette feels a special affinity for two: Robert Henri, the revered instructor and founder of the Ashcan School, and James Fitzgerald, the Irishman from Boston, who marched to his own drummer and created some of the most powerful oils and watercolors of the island. According to the arts writer Carl Little: “Michael Vermette, who emulates the vision of one of Monhegan’s great painters of the past, James Fitzgerald (1899–1971), adds his own impasto oomph to iconic views.”

Vermette has had a double career as a full-time painter and a part-time teacher. Just after graduating in the 1980s with degrees in painting and in education, Michael was honored to be named the inaugural arts teacher at the Indian Island School in Old Town, a position he held until 2018. Along the way, he married a member of the Penobscot tribe. Together, Michael and his wife continue to live on the Indian Island reservation in Old Town. The plein-air master approaches his career as an artist with energy and imagination.

Besides painting on his own time, Michael has taught dozens of workshops, been juried into prestigious competitions that have taken him from Cape Elizabeth to Mount Desert Island, and won more awards than can be easily counted. Despite all of the awards and the legions of grateful students, Michael regards his artist residencies as among his highest achievements. He has been selected for residencies in places as diverse as Acadia National Park and Monhegan Island, but it is being awarded the first-ever artist residency at the Allagash Wilderness Waterway in far northern Maine that he is proudest of. According to Michael, “I was utterly astounded that they would pick me out of the hundreds of applicants (from all over the country) who had applied.”

Please join us at Gleason Fine Art gallery in Boothbay Harbor on Friday, Sept. 18, from 5 to 7 p.m., to celebrate Michael Vermette’s Monhegan series. Michael will be present to share a glass of wine, and many stories from the art world, with you. Phone 207-633-6849 for more information. See all of Michael’s new work on our easy-to-use website: gleasonfineart.com