Celebrate Hope with UMVA in May

There is no doubt these are trying times we live in from the political to the environmental. How do we find hope in an uncertain future? Twenty UMVA (Union of Maine Visual Artists) members have created work that speaks to that topic beginning May 2 through May 29 at the Oak St. Lofts Gallery, 72 Oak St., Portland Maine. An artists' reception is set for First Friday, May 1, 2026 from 5 to 8 pm. Gallery hours are 1 to 5 pm Saturdays and Sundays. Noted Maine artist Jane Dahmen was the juror for this show.

The artists have responded dynamically in charcoal, acrylic and oil paints as well as photography, collage, sculpture and assemblage. All of the work in the show is either 8 x 8" or smaller. These works celebrate the promise of new thoughts and dreams which agree with the poet Emily Dickinson that "Hope is a strange invention- A Patent of the Heart-In unremitting action-Yet never wearing out-"

Featured artists are Andre Benoit, Annie Fischer, Audrey Parker, Ave Melnick, Bradford Fuller, Bruce McMillan, Cheryl Cayer, Daryne Rockett, Gregg Harper, Jackie C. Walsh, Jim Kelly, Kathryn Shagas, Kimberley Harding, Lisa Mossel, Liz Kalloch, Mary Brooking, Norma Johnson, Robert Lockwood, Timothy Crawford Wilson, and Wimberley Burton.

"It was a privilege to jury this show", said Dahmen. "Hope is symbolic of new beginnings, as is spring in our part of the world. Perhaps the works in this show will inspire viewers to animate new growth, and embolden their responses to whatever challenges they are facing. The best art fuels heartfelt sentiments and sometimes opens new pathways to understanding."

The Union of Maine Visual Artists is a nonprofit organization and vital artist network of over 400 Maine artists and art lovers. Founded in 1975, the UMVA remains a statewide connector of Artists, Collectors and Art Lovers, fostering camaraderie and connection in interconnected, mutually supportive, ever-growing state-wide community of visual artists and informed public that treasures and supports the arts and artists. To further enhance Maine Arts and Artists, UMVA publishes the Maine Arts Journal - a quarterly online Arts magazine; Maine Masters film series of artist profiles, often seen on PBS Television; Artists' Rapid Response Team! (ARRT!) banners, placards & posters for public causes; LumenARRT! projections on public buildings for awareness of public injustice; Sponsorship of art projects in the public interest. Additionally, UMVA has advocated for Maine art and artists to promote the common good.

For example, UMVA initiated and helped enact into state law the Maine Percent for Art Program, requiring 1% of funds for new state buildings to include art, and the Artist's Estate Tax Law allowing art work to be used to pay artists' estate taxes. UMVA continues to oppose entry fees for exhibitions and support requirements for organizations holding art auctions to give artists a percentage of the sale of their work. For more information on UMVA, go to https://theumva.org.

Dahmen, who moved to Maine in 2004, is a contemporary realist whose recent landscapes explore the trees, fields, rivers, streams and coastal regions of midcoast Maine. Dahmen's work has been shown in solo and group shows both in the U.S. and abroad. Dahmen was Maine Audubon's signature artist in 2005, and was a featured artist in the September, 2009 issue of Maine Home + Design magazine, and their Artists' Issues of 2011 and 2012. She was featured in the September 2014 issue of Old Port magazine. One of her paintings hung in the White House in Washington D.C. in the late 1980's- 1990's, and several of her paintings were part of a show at the U.S. Embassy in Bosnia Herzegovina in 2002. Graphique de France sold posters of her work all over the world during the 1990's and early 2000's.

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