Thurnscoe, Ogunquit, Me. 1004

Thurnscoe, Ogunquit, Me. 1004

Thurnscoe, Ogunquit, Me. Image shows a complex of shingled shacks on a gravel beach on the shore in Ogunquit. The title, "Thurnscoe", refers to the summer art school set up in the shacks in 1911 by the artist Hamilton Easter Field. A New York City student of painter Charles Woodbury, who ran an outdoor painting program in Oqunquit, Field was also attracted to the coastal landscape here, but favored a modernist approach and based his teaching on life study with nude models indoors. His studio is the building at the far left with the large windows. Field's Thurnscoe School of Modern Art became an alternative to Woodbury's Ogunquit Summer School of Drawing and Painting, which focused on plein air studies of nature. Despite their differing philosophies, the two schools coexisted for many years and solidified Oqunquit's identity as a summer artists' colony. [Anthony de Feo, Daily Art Magazine, 4/18/2017]