Tom Hall: RECENT LANDSCAPES

August 3 - September 2, 2023
EXHIBIT EXTENDED THROUGH SEPT 2

Tom Hall captures the rugged, haunting beauty of the Maine landscape. Whether pristine or impacted by human hands, Hall emotionally conveys the true spirit of the place depicted in a manner that is immediately recognizable as his own.

Artist’s Statement

Tom Hall interviews Tom Hall

TH1: Let’s start with the basics. You were born where?

TH2: I was born right here in Portland. Matter of fact, right on Congress Street.

TH1: Congress Street? That’s very local. And you went to school…

TH2: University of Oregon, school of architecture, in Eugene. Then to Boston for 12 years, working as a young architect. Working in the big city as a young man was a life adventure. I think all Maine grads should leave the state, see the world, and then return and help make Maine even better.

TH1: Architecture? I thought you went to school for painting.

TH2: No, never took a painting class. Just picked it up along the way. Eventually the art passion took over the architecture passion. The immediacy and the control of painting won me over. I had my first studio in Somerville, MA. Down by the railroad tracks. In a building of 60 artists. I look back and see it as my art school.

TH1: I noticed the barn paintings in this show. That’s different.

TH2: Well, I painted Maine barns when I was that young painter in Somerville. Inspired by the late Wolf Kahn’s barn paintings. Kahn was brilliant. The work and the painter. With his recent passing, the barn paintings here are a simple gesture of thanks.

TH1: Are the small paintings, the tiny ones, studies for larger work?

TH2: No, the small ones are meant as finished pieces. Often bigger pieces are suggested by the smalls but it’s not a given. And a small piece, even the tiny ones, as you say, can be just as monumental as a big.

TH1: These are all Maine landscapes?

TH2: Yes. Actually the locales here represent a life’s footprint, of sorts. A triangle…Lakes Region to Moosehead Lake and back to Portland. I’ve done a lot of hiking over the years…as a landscape painter should. It’s been kind of a Huck Finn life. Of course the work has to get done and done well. That’s what you sign up for.

TH1: And Maine art?

TH2: Oh, one has to be excited. It’s the only option. I’ve seen institutions and galleries come and go. It’s all a cycle. The artist…and everyone else… needs to just work and stop moaning. Do the good work that uplifts and educates… making a better Maine.

TH1: What’s next?

TH2: I’m working on some pieces for a group show in October at Cove Street Arts…on sports.

TH1: Sports? What does a landscape painter do with that?

TH2: Well, that’s what I’m wondering about myself.

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