Jonesport painter Anne Neely’s new show, ‘The Wonder of the Light’ is at Elizabeth Moss Galleries through Aug. 15, as a documentary about her life makes the rounds.
Every morning, Anne Neely is awoken by the sun rising over Roque Island.
The artist doesn’t have shades on her windows, so the light pours freely into her bedroom, and she has to decide whether to wake up and move into the light, or to stay asleep.
Though the light is an everyday occurrence for Neely, her decision to begin painting it last year came as a surprise to her.
She was in Brooklyn, thinking about her mornings back home in Jonesport, when she chose to rotate her canvas for the first time. Formerly a landscape painter, the choice to paint vertically represented a shift into a more personal and figurative creative exploration.
For Neely’s new collection “The Wonder of the Light,” now on display at Elizabeth Moss Galleries in Portland through Aug. 15, she poured paint in ribbons down vertical canvases and then painted the background behind.
View from painter Anne Neely’s Jonesport studio in 2019. (Photo courtesy of Anne Neely)
For Portlanders eager to hear more about the artist behind the exhibit, a short documentary about Neely will be looping at the Portland Museum of Art starting on July 17 and running through the end of summer.
FINDING THE LIGHT
Getting to the art studio in Brooklyn was difficult.
Neely was recovering from the chemotherapy she undertook to treat ovarian cancer, and she had to walk up and down about 80 steps in the subway each day, relying on walking poles to keep herself steady. Then it was another 40-second walk up to her 250-square-foot apartment when the day was over.
Even despite her ill health and the taxing ordeal of moving there, Neely was thrilled to be in Brooklyn, one of only 17 artists picked out of almost 2,000 applicants by the Sharpe-Walentas Studio program, a yearlong art residency providing studio space and community to visual artists.
“By the time I got there every day, I was exhausted, but I was also invigorated because I was with 16 much younger artists. I felt very lucky and honored to be there,” said Neely.
She began her painting process at Sharpe-Walentas by setting up a ladder and developed a system to pour paint down the canvases.
The ribbons of color represented protection from the cancer — which Neely says is now in remission — but she still had to decide what to paint behind them.
The second vertical painting in Neely’s “The Wonder of the Light” collection, “In the Morning, I…” shows the light in Jonesport peeking through the colorful ribbons. Neely said that her decision to bring the yellow paint all the way down the canvas caught her by surprise.
Anne Neely, “In the Morning, I…,” 2025, oil on linen. (Image courtesy of Julia Featheringill Photography)
After “In the Morning, I…,” Neely decided that she wanted the background of each of the ribboned paintings in the exhibit to be the sky and the sea.
“You see all those little tiny things that I did with the ocean,” said Neely. “Well, those are all the colors that were in the ocean when the light came through or the shimmer or the white caps because there was lots of wind.”
Though most of the “The Wonder of the Light” paintings are vertical, the collection also includes a few horizontal paintings that represent Neely’s cancer.
In these paintings, an explosion of paint mimics the chaotic multiplication of cancer cells.
Anne Neely’s current show “The Wonder of the Light” is at Moss Galleries in Portland. From left are “Woven Veil,
“Moonlight (partially showing),” “Best Clouds,” “Shimmer” and “Emerging.” (Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer)
Because ovarian cancer is particularly serious and stubborn, Neely must get assessed frequently to make sure she is still in remission.
“Every three months, I move forward in life or back into cancer. So, of course, when I am in remission, I paint the sheer beauty of being alive in the light,” said Neely.
As the light flooded in through the gallery’s large windows, Neely stood in front of “In the morning, I…” and said, “Light was critical. You know, I could see gray, too.”
BLENDING ART AND FILM
Neely’s decision to keep looking for and moving toward the light has earned her additional recognition. Both the National Gallery of Art and the Portland Museum of Art plan to screen a short documentary about Neely this year.
The documentary, produced by the National Gallery of Art as part of their “West to East” program, shows Neely’s life in Jonesport.
Scott Keiner, head of the production studio at the National Gallery of Art, said they chose to feature Neely — one of only seven artists in the country in their “West to East” series — because they found her inspirational. Neely will be representing the Northeastern United States.
“We loved so many things about Anne — her practice, her unique “pouring” technique, and her deep connection to the waters and people of Jonesport,” said Keiner.
The documentary also discusses Neely’s experience with cancer.
“After filming was complete, she sent us a catalog for her exhibition, and the works might as well have leapt off the page,” said Keiner. “During a really challenging time in her life, Anne found a way to create works of art to protect herself, but when I see them, I feel like she’s protecting all of us.”
The documentary will be released this fall on YouTube and the National Gallery of Art’s website. Keiner said to stay tuned about screenings at the gallery itself in Washington, D.C.
For Mainers interested in seeing the film before it’s released online, the Portland Museum of Art will be looping it in its gallery beside a painting of Neely’s starting July 17 and continuing through the rest of the summer.
Andrew Eschelbacher, deputy director and head of art and exhibitions at the Portland Museum of Art, said, “there’s a great moment in the film where she talks about blending colors. She’s looking out at the landscape. Her painting comes from her experience here, but it’s not limited to her experience here, and its impact isn’t limited to her experience here.”
“It’s really something that extends from Maine and makes reverberations nationally,” Eschelbacher added.
LIFE IN A SEASIDE TOWN
Neely, who now splits her time between Jonesport and Boston, originally moved to the small Maine seaside town to be with her husband.
She was inspired by not only the light passing over Roque Island in the morning, but also the fishing community there.
Anne Neely with her pieces “Best Clouds,” left, and “Shimmer,” part of her current exhibit “The Wonder of the Light” at Moss Galleries in Portland. (Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer)
When she first began painting, the artist gravitated toward realism, thinking she had to capture each moment on the ocean with the precision of a photograph.
“The beauty, I quickly learned, was not something I could replicate. I wasn’t realistic as a painter,” said Neely.
But she soon realized that she could paint her ideas and curiosity about nature in an abstract way and that these paintings could resonate with people.
For “Water Stories,” a collection of paintings the artist created previously, she began pouring paint onto the canvas to evoke the movement of water.
Though she admired the brilliant views in Jonesport, she was also drawn to hidden water: the aquifers unseen but essential to humans, groundwater that moves underneath us through sand and rock to supply fresh water for drinking and agriculture.
Neely’s “Water Stories” collection focuses on how humans misuse the environment, causing climate change and the host of issues it presents.
“There’s a mission in being an artist. We’re harbingers of hope. We’re harbingers of making sure people understand how precious this place is, and how important it is, both being human, but also respecting the nature around us,” said Neely from her studio in Jonesport.
Anne Neely painting outside her studio in Jonesport in 2019. (Photo by Ella Zona)
Aquifers have been significantly impacted by climate change, which alters how they take in and distribute water and ultimately results in a global depletion of groundwater supplies.
It’s not just the aquifers Neely is concerned with. Her once thriving fishing community in Jonesport has suffered from overfishing and increasing ocean temperatures that drive away the fish and lobster that the fishermen and the town depend on.
Neely described Jonesport as a beautiful place becoming increasingly skeletal as young people move away to find jobs in other areas.
“When your livelihood is dependent on nature and on the ocean, and it changes because you can’t get what you need from the ocean, then that pushes people,” said Neely.
One of Neely’s friends is a fisherman who had intended to give his grandson his fishing company when he retired, but now expects his company to go under in the next five years or so because of the shortage of lobsters.
Paint and paintbrushes in Anne Neely’s studio in 2025 (Photo credit: Anne Neely)
Before “The Wonder of the Light,” Neely’s work on climate change was exhibited in museums and galleries across the country. She received residencies in the United States and Ireland and was even a finalist for the Prix de Rome.
The themes in her paintings — coping with outer and inner disasters and finding the beauty and hope in the light — have resonated with people across the world.
“I think her paintings can give us some of those words for that intersection of beauty and foreboding that happens in the environment and happens in an environment that’s threatened under a changing climate,” said Eschelbacher.
Elizabeth Moss, the owner of Elizabeth Moss Galleries, related Neely’s work to the abstract expressionist masters and said she fits into the canon of 20th and 21st century American art. She praised Neely not just for the themes in her artwork, but also the process itself.
“She achieved some incredible qualities in the texture and the paint and capturing atmosphere,” said Moss.
With the help of her assistant, Michael Hayden, Neely has her painting routine down to a science.
“When I do a pour, the wind cannot be more than 10 miles an hour. It has to be sunny because, after the pour, the canvases go flat on the grass, and they dry in the sun,” said Neely. “And they have to be able to do that for at least two or three hours. So, my time of doing a pour is usually between 12 and 2 p.m. And then I let them dry until 5 p.m.”
But outside of the science, it’s the emotion, hope, and light she communicates with each pour and brushstroke that so deeply resonates with people.
“In the end, our ancient hearts are the best thing to depend on making art,” said Neely.
IF YOU GO
“The Wonder of the Light,” through Aug. 15 at Elizabeth Moss Galleries, 100 Fore St. Suite B, Portland. Neely will give an artist talk on Aug. 6 from 5-7 p.m. at the gallery. For more, go to elizabethmossgalleries.com
The “West to East” documentary about Anne Neely will show through August at the Portland Museum of Art, 7 Congress Square. For more, go to portlandmuseum.org