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CMCA

@cmcanow

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21 Winter Street, Rockland, Maine
Open Wed-Sat: 10am-5pm | Sun: 12pm-5pm. Closed federal holidays.

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We are pleased to announce Grant Wahlquist as CMCA’s Interim Director. A respected curator and cultural leader with deep ties to Maine’s arts community, Wahlquist brings nearly two decades of curatorial and critical experience to the role.

“We couldn’t be more delighted knowing we have someone as talented as Grant to step in and provide steady leadership for CMCA,” said CMCA Board Co-chairs Carolyn Watson and Rick Franklin. “He has demonstrated the leadership qualities we value, and through his curatorial vision and management abilities during his tenure at CMCA, has proven that he can successfully lead the organization into its 75th anniversary year.”

Wahlquist joined CMCA in July 2025 as curator, overseeing the museum’s dynamic exhibition program. Over the last year, he has curated or overseen 10 changing exhibitions, including the upcoming Because the Sky is Blue, opening October 2.

“I am honored to step into this role at such an important moment of growth and renewed momentum,” said Wahlquist. “CMCA has an extraordinary history of championing artists and introducing audiences to ambitious contemporary art, and I look forward to partnering with our talented staff and board to build on and expand that legacy.”

Join us in congratulating Grant on his new role!

📷 @dananielsenclark taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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15 hours ago

Because the Sky is Blue opens ONE WEEK FROM TODAY, Friday, October 2 from 4–7pm during Rockland’s First Friday ArtWalk and we can hardly wait to welcome you 🦋

Featuring Artists Clémentine Adou, Wilfrid Almendra, Bo Bartlett, Vija Celmins, Selena Kimball, Ryosuke Kumakura, Glenn Ligon, Sharon Lockhart, Matthew Metzger, Julie Poitras Santos, and Miao Wang.

Because the Sky is Blue examines the histories of painting and its place as a critical practice today. Bringing together artists strongly associated with Maine and voices from beyond the region, the exhibition explores works that inhabit multiple histories, media, and genres, challenging conventional distinctions between painting, sculpture, photography, and film.

Join us for a festive opening reception with DJ Alien Baby ( @allisoncekala ) in the courtyard and tacos served up by @taqueria.max.

Free admission to our galleries on First Friday is made possible by our fantastic sponsor @camdennational !

While installation is in progress, our galleries are closed, however, the CMCA Shop is open during regular hours.

Image:
Selena Kimball, Atlas of Air, fig. 33, 2021, Collaged pigment prints on Hahnemühle rice paper, framed, 8.5 x 8.5 inches (sheet), Courtesy of the artist and Ulterior Gallery, New York

@clementineadou
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@thebobartlett
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@selena_kimball
@ryosuke_kumakura
@glennligon
@sharonlockhartstudio
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@wmiao_oaimw taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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6 days ago

We’re halfway there! The 2027 CMCA Biennial Open Call has received 150 applications. Deadline is October 9, however, review is limited to 300 eligible applicants and will close once that limit is reached.

If you’ve been thinking about applying, now is the time!

Application Guidelines + FAQs at the link in bio 🪼 taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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9 days ago

We are over the moon for @inciardimachines NEW DROP at the CMCA shop 🪙🪙🪙🪙

Bring your quarters and join the fun during open hours Monday—Saturday 10am to 5pm | Sunday noon to 5pm taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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12 days ago

Hello makers! Join artist Olive Gawlik for September’s Adult Makerspace inspired by their textile drawings and the ways personal adornment can become an archive of memory, identity, and self-expression.

Through close looking and conversation, you’ll consider the signs, images, lyrics, and motifs that hold meaning for you, then translate them into a wearable patch or directly onto a piece of clothing brought from home. No drawing experience required. Come prepared to think about the memories, interests, and details that make you, you.

Adult Makerspace with Olive Gawlik
Sunday, September 20 | 10am-12pm
Adults 18+ | Sliding scale $5-15
Attendance capped at 20 | First come, first served ArtLab at CMCA

Learn more at at the link in our bio 🦢

📷 @dananielsenclark taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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20 days ago

CMCA is pleased to announce Nyeema Morgan, Haynes Riley, and CMCA Curator Grant Wahlquist as jurors for the 2027 CMCA Biennial!

The longest-running statewide juried exhibition in Maine, the CMCA Biennial highlights current developments in contemporary art by Maine-based and connected artists.

Applications open September 11, 2026 at 9 a.m. ET and close October 9, 2026 at 5 p.m. ET. Review is limited to 300 eligible applicants, and artists are strongly encouraged to apply early.

JURORS

Nyeema Morgan is a visual artist and Assistant Professor of Sculpture at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. A graduate of Cooper Union and California College of the Arts, she also attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. Her work has been presented at the Neubauer Collegium, Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, Worcester Art Museum, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, and The Drawing Center, among others: Morgan was an Artist-in-Residence at the Joan Mitchell Center and currently serves on the Joan Mitchell Foundation’s board.

Haynes Riley is an artist, curator, designer, and founder of the gallery Good Weather. He received an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art and studied at The Mountain School of Arts. Riley has exhibited nationally, and his writing has appeared in Portable Gray, OE!, Temporary Art Review, and Burnaway. Through Good Weather, he has organized exhibitions in Chicago and Arkansas and participated in international fairs and programs including Artissima, Liste, Paris Internationale, Material, and NADA.

Grant Wahlquist is CMCA’s Curator.

Find application details, deadlines, responses to FAQs, and learn more about the jurors at the link in bio.

We look forward to seeing what you’ve been working on!

Photos L to R: Nyeema Morgan by Erin Morgan Taylor; Haynes Riley by Evan Jenkins taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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a month ago

While we install our new exhibition, Because the Sky is Blue, the CMCA Shop is open!

Visit Abbey Williams’ Fugue in its final week, on view through September 20 with Pay What You Wish admission and stop into the Shop during regular hours.

Monday–Saturday, 10am–5pm | Sunday, noon–5pm.

Learn more at the link in our bio ⛓️‍💥 taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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16 days ago

It has been an extraordinary pleasure to watch visitors of all ages encounter the optical wonder of Will Sears’ The Third Field since it was installed at CMCA in January.

Producing something beyond its individual elements, these carefully orchestrated relationships give rise to what Sears calls a “third field.” It begins as an optical phenomenon, as adjacent colors alter our perception of one another, but becomes a space where what we see gives rise to what we feel.

After eight months on our walls, this is the final week to experience The Third Field at CMCA, on view through Sunday, September 6.

Plan your visit at the link in our bio 💙❤️💚🩵

📷: @artindexphotography taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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a month ago

One last First Friday with our summer exhibitions! We hope to see you this Friday, September 4 from 4–7 pm for free admission and a final chance to catch the season’s shows during Rockland’s ArtWalk.

Live music by Faith Leaders in the courtyard and Open Studios in the CMCA ArtLab 🎨

Thank you to @camdennational whose generous support makes CMCA’s First Friday possible! by @cmcanow

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a month ago

This is the final week to experience @marcswanson’s remarkable exhibition, Death is Expensive, on view through September 20.

“The title of this exhibition, Death is Expensive, is drawn from a line uttered by down-at-heel Southern belle Blanche DuBois in Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire: “How in the hell do you think all that sickness and dying was paid for? Death is expensive, Miss Stella!” In Streetcar, DuBois’s carefully maintained artifice—paste jewels passing for diamonds, borrowed elegance masking scarcity—functions as both a shield and a tenuous means of escape. The tension between luminous surface and underlying vulnerability is also present in Swanson’s work, which stages a parallel drama in materials: elevating the cheap, the decaying, or the everyday into objects of genuine and often melancholic beauty that never fully conceal their provisional or humble origins. Artifice is not deception
but a necessary and sometimes defiant form of grace.”
— @grant_wahlquist

Plan your visit at the link in our bio 🔗

Photos: @artindexphotography taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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25 days ago

Bianca Beck’s solo exhibition Eyes is on view through September 6! Catch this monumental show during its final weeks at CMCA.

Hours:
Monday—Saturday | 10am—5pm
Sunday | noon—5pm

Learn more about Bianca Beck: Eyes at the link in bio.

Installation photos: @artindexphotography taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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a month ago

SAVE THE DATE: Because the Sky is Blue | Opening Reception October 2 from 4–7pm at CMCA.

Artists
Clémentine Adou (Paris, France)
Wilfrid Almendra (Marseille, France)
Bo Bartlett (Columbus, Georgia and Wheaton Island, Maine)
Vija Celmins (New York, New York)
Selena Kimball (New York, New York and Brooksville, Maine)
Ryosuke Kumakura (Rockport, Maine)
Glenn Ligon (New York, New York)
Sharon Lockhart (Los Angeles, California)
Matthew Metzger (Chicago, Illinois)
Julie Poitras Santos (Portland, Maine)
Miao Wang (Chicago, Illinois)

CMCA is thrilled to announce Because the Sky is Blue, a rich examination of critical histories of painting and the status of painting as a critical practice in our present moment.

Image:
Bo Bartlett, Blue Sky, September 11, 2012, Wheaton Island, Maine, 2012, Oil on panel, framed, 18 x 18 inches, (unframed); 25 x 25 inches (framed), Courtesy of the artist and the Bo Bartlett Center, Columbus, Georgia

Read more at the link in our bio 🪁 taken in Center for Maine Contemporary Art by @cmcanow

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a month ago