Emily Nelligan,
22 SEPT 09
, 2009, charcoal on paper, 7 1/4 x 10 1/2 inches
"Ever since her first trip to Cranberry Island following her graduation in 1944 from Cooper Union, Emily Nelligan (1924 – 2018) returned every summer to make charcoal drawings of the shoreline and sea of this Maine island off Mount Desert. Cranberry Island was Nelligan’s sole muse. . .
When asked what aspect of Cranberry Island made her fall in love with it, Nelligan said it was the dense fog that veiled the island. Like much of Maine’s northern coast and island, Cranberry Island is a moody place, austere in its beauty, rich in spruce trees, and overwhelmed by the atmosphere of the sea and sky. In almost all her drawings, Nelligan captures the island at twilight when failing light softens the outlines of the trees and mutes the contrasting textures of the sky and water . . .
Nelligan’s seascapes are tinged with melancholy not only because the moodiness of the sea can produce such emotions, but because she witnessed human activities that damaged the vast albeit delicate body of water. Her drawings are instead filled with disquiet in the face of potential loss – knowing that her time on the island is transitory and her vision of it fleeting."
--(Alison Ferris, 2000, on the occasion of a Bowdoin College Museum exhibition.)
