For Immediate Release 

Sheri Oliva/Yarmouth Arts Alliance/207.329.0681 

Email: olivasheri@gmail.com 

Catherine Bickford/Artist/207.838.5154 

Email: catherine@catherinebickford.com 

Field of Study an exhibition of works 

by artist Catherine Bickford

(Yarmouth, ME) In the spring of 2020, news of the COVID-19 pandemic spread like wildfire. The streets went quiet and socializing came to an abrupt end. The whole world was suddenly gripped by fear and uncertainty. Artist Catherine Bickford leaned into her art practice as a way to survive those scary days. “I remember feeling incredibly lucky that we went into ‘lock down’ in Spring rather than Fall,” recalls Bickford. “The world had ‘gone dark,’ but here in Maine the days kept getting longer and eventually I tumbled out of my house and into my flower bed. I felt the security of seeing my beloved perennials again and I painted them like portraits of old friends.” She didn’t stop there. She found other gardens to incorporate in her work, including the Yarmouth Community Garden. In 2022 she was awarded an Artist Springboard grant from the Maine Arts Commission to continue her work and create a solo exhibition, now on view through at Merrill Memorial Library, 215 Main Street, Yarmouth, Maine until Saturday, May 3rd, 2023. 

Field of Study features 15 paintings that were painted through direct observation combined with synthetic reinterpretation in her studio. The sizes and colors of the paintings are diverse and demand our investigation: from Full Tilt, which confronts us with an almost monochrome exploration of yellow, to the otherworldly green blue of Field of Study No 2. In the latter the figures are engaged in the activity of the harvest and seem poised to exit the painting directly into our viewing space. In this way we are participants; expected to do our share. According to renowned plein air artist Jill Hoy, “Bickford’s show is a gutsy, daring, and nourishing take on planting, harvest and growth. This fresh, direct work allows us to witness the subject through Bickford’s process of searching, seeking, and finding visual invention.”

Bickford explores the sensory memory of plants, dirt, sun, and weather, and she intently summons viewers to dig into these visceral environments with her. At the same time, these paintings are transformational, illustrating the magic of the growth cycle, from seed to full flowering. These canvases are marked not by pictorial representation, but by sensations, whether through the action portrayed or the flood of color that washes through our memories as we take in the brightly colored works. “We’ve all been outside on a hot summer day when the sunlight floods our vision and we see through that lens. That type of sensation is where I am working from when I create these works,” says Bickford.

Merrill Memorial Library, 215 Main St, Yarmouth, will be hosting an Artist Talk with Catherine Bickford on Saturday, April 29th from 4-6pm. 

As part of her grant activity,  Bickford has offered classes and workshops at the community garden. She will be conducting two more “Sketching from Life” mini classes on Sunday June 18 & Sunday June 25th at the Yarmouth Community Garden, 615 E Main St, Yarmouth, ME. The cost is $10 and proceeds benefit YCG. To sign up visit www.artascope.org or call 207-847-4060.

“Funded in part by a grant from the Maine Arts Commission, an independent state agency supported by the National Endowment for the Arts”