WINSLOW HOMER'S STUDIO OPENS TO PUBLIC

The Portland Museum of Art has announced plans to open Winslow Homer’s landmarked coastal studio to the public on Sept. 24, 2012. Located in Prouts Neck, Me., about 12 miles from the museum, the studio is a "cultural treasure" where Homer made his best-known paintings, according to museum director Mark H. C. Bessire.

Simultaneously, the PMA is presenting “Weatherbeaten,” Sept. 22-Dec. 30, 2012, a show of 30 oils that Homer painted at the studio. The museum has been raising funds to open the renovated studio, where Homer lived and worked from 1883 until he died, in 1910, since it bought the space from the artist’s great-grandnephew Charles Homer Willauer in 2006. So far it has raised $8.5 million of its $10.5 million goal.

The early American landscape and marine artist has a long history with the museum. He held an exhibition of paintings there in 1893, which included his well-known epic oil painting Signal of Distress, 1891-1896. And later, in 1976, collector Charles Shipman Payson gave the museum 13 Homer watercolors, four oil paintings and $8 million for a new wing to house the collection.

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