Island Occurrences

In an exclusive interview, Jamie Wyeth discusses his Maine island sanctuary and new works now on view at Farnsworth Art Museum.

- Michael Clawson

Twelve nautical miles off the coast of Maine sits Monhegan Island, a rock that juts out of the Atlantic measuring just 4½ square miles. Though the population is less than 100 people, the island is home to a curious lot. There’s a Rockefeller on a porch, a squealing man with a lobster bib, a World War II POW, a communist artist and vicious seagulls.

And artists. Lots of artists. Some of the best. George Bellows, Robert Henri, Edward Hopper, Edward Willis Redfield. All ghosts, except for one. Jamie Wyeth. The painter— son of Andrew Wyeth, grandson of N.C. Wyeth—maintains a home and studio on the island where he paints some of the locals and gets lost amid the mist of the sea and the fog of time.

“It’s quite fantastic living here, which I guess is the problem—too many people are thinking the same way. During the winter there’s maybe five families on the island, but then summer rolls around and it balloons to hundreds of people, mostly day-trippers,” the 76-year-old Wyeth says. “It’s physically spectacular. You’re just out here in the middle of the Atlantic. I have a house here, where I avoid the crowds inside my box where I work.”