Dear Editor:

I've been a summer and short off season visitor to Southport since 1979. I'm “from away” yes, but I know I share a similar perspective on the recent changes to the environment of Cozy Harbor and Pratt's Island as a great many of the native folks of all persuasions, as well as the lobstermen do.

I'm an artist and the illustrator of 75 children's books. I was fortunate enough to have had 90 of my paintings (85 percent of which are from Southport) of coastal Maine published as a fine art book titled “My Maine, the Coastal Watercolors of Normand Chartier” by Down East Books. My paintings rely to a great extent on interpreting the visual “sense of place” and the commitment to hard work and survival by trust in Providence and nature to scratch out a living and a future for your family, which this area and way of life showcases.

Unfortunately, that “place and life” are  being slowly downgraded by erosion from the lust for power through money and for stature through the size of one's holdings through money. I believe this disregard for the value of simple pleasures, and the disregard for the sanctity of the natural environment are a danger to peaceful coexistence and a pollution that is not reversible.

On page 75 of my book there is a painting titled “Farewell to my Sanctuary.” I painted it soon after the last expanse of the undeveloped tip of Pratt's Island was subdivided and sold. It shows the undisturbed right half of Pratt’s Beach, the Cat Ledges, and part of the then still wooded area going up to that land. The sky shows the beginnings of a possible incoming storm. The title is prophetic for its time, but that was easy to predict.

My wish now would be to please not blast away any more of what's left of this most valuable small piece of the original sanctuary. Oh, and in reply to the gentleman from Eco Analysis, it already is different looking from the time of that painting.

Normand Chartier
Brooklyn, Conn.