We weighed anchor and headed out of Seal Bay at 0800 and had a pleasant trip over to Maple Juice Cove, passing by the quaint town of North Haven.
Maple Juice Cove is a peaceful anchorage at the mouth of the Saint George River and we were pleasantly surprised by what we discovered here.
After we set the anchor, we noticed a very familiar house across the cove. It turns out it’s the house depicted in Andrew Wyeth’s famous 1948 painting, “Christina’s World”. Wyeth summered in nearby Port Clyde from where he regularly rowed to Maple Juice Cove to visit friends and to paint.
There’s more to this painting than meets the eye. It turns out that Christina Olson, Wyeth’s dear friend who lived here with her brother, was afflicted with a rare neurodegenerative disease and lost the ability to walk in her late 20s. Rather than a wheelchair, she chose to propel herself by pulling herself along the ground with her arms. Thus the pose in the painting.
We enjoyed learning about this artist and the Olson family.
Can you tell which is the original?
9 Responses
Andrew Wyeth is one of our favorite artists. We got lucky and saw a showing of a lot of his work.
Never knew the story behind this work though.
Thanks for the lesson.
We were fascinated by it too!
That was an interesting video about Christina and the painting. I recognized the painting but had no idea of the story behind it. Thanks for sharing.
Wow! Very interesting video about the painting. Larry and I went to a Wyeth museum (we think in Rockland, Maine when we were there last year. They had mostly sketches of his and I think his son??? Not sure about that. My dad really appreciated Andrew Wyeth so I grew up with framed prints of his work, including the one he did of a sailboat lying on a grass field.
Very interesting!
Happy that you included the incisive mini-lecture on “Christina’s World.”
Learned a lot about this painting!
Another fabulous blog. ! The link to Christina’s portrait so interesting and clever to add Sandy into the moment.
It seems the places to visit are unending off the Maine coast, you both are finding one adventure after the other. Enjoy.
Truly a great place indeed.