This full-day workshop takes place on April 25, 2024, and runs from approximately 4:30 AM to 7:30 PM. It is designed to maximize learning opportunities and provide guidance on creating the kind of images you want to create. From sunrise to sunset, you will alternate between traveling around Acadia taking photos, and classroom time where we discuss a range of topics that lead to successful, self-expressive image-making. There will also be individual instruction based on your goals and your questions.

What do I mean when I say, self-expression? Am I talking about art? To be honest I struggle with calling myself an artist. I’m uncomfortable with that title. I’m a photographer. Photographer is a very comfortable title for me. But if I want my photography to be personal, I need to express my emotions, my thoughts, and the stories I want to tell through my imagery. I want to express to you, the viewer, how I connect with the subjects that I photograph.

The cost is $150 for Museum members and $175 for non-members. Spaces are limited. Registration is required.

Cyanotype, also called sun-printing, is an early photographic process that produces blue and white prints. It is usually done in bright sunlight, but can also produce beautiful images on overcast days, and can be done indoors with a specialized UV light. You’ll have a chance to try both sunlight and artificial light.

In this 2-hour workshop, we will work with 5x7 watercolor paper and will use a variety of objects, including feathers, dried ferns, evergreen branches, paper snowflakes, and chandelier prisms to make winter woodland-inspired scenes.

Jennifer Booher is an artist and photographer from Bar Harbor. She has been a Resident Artist with Acadia National Park since 2015, and artist-in-residence with the MDI Historical Society since 2018.

Flock to the Gilley for a fun and informative few hours with Seth Benz, the bird ecology director at Schoodic Institute. Seth will delve into research and share current sightings and insights. Bring your own questions and curiosity, a favorite bird-related reading, or your latest observations. Depending on weather, the group might go for a bird-sighting walk outside. The goal for this last Bird Chatter of the spring is to spend as much as possible of it outdoors.

A California native, Jennifer has taught at the University of Maine-Orono since 2000 where she has served as Director of Creative Writing, co-advisor to The Open Field, and Coordinator of Undergraduate Studies.  She is an award-winning poet and author of seven books of poetry, a book of essays, and a memoir. Her work has been included in two Norton Anthologies and in The Best American Poetry 2002. In 2005 she was granted the Lynda Hull Poetry Award from Denver Quarterly, and in 2015 her book The Open Secret was awarded the Poetry Society of America’s William Carlos Williams award and was a finalist for the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. For this PNA, she will be discussing her book For the Good of All, Do Not Destroy the Birds, a blend of literary criticism and memoir that recounts a life spent in the company of birds and poems, intimately attuned to the mysteries of singing.

This will be an in-person event with special host Carl Little, but can also be attended online. We will send a Zoom link to those who choose the online option when reserving space. There will be an artist reception at 6pm.

People-Nature-Art is a monthly series that brings artists, writers, carvers, and creative types of all kinds to the Gilley to explore how nature and art interact in their work, and how their art impacts their own approach to nature.