Downtown Bangor art studio offers tour

BANGOR – Photographer Edwin Martin and painter Kenneth Schiano don’t seem to have a lot in common. At least, not at first glance.

Martin’s black-and-white photographs document quiet moments. They spark memories and ignite the desire to climb into the frame. Schiano’s abstract pastels boldly challenge conceptions about space and reality. His large paintings are surprisingly seductive, yet insinuate hidden danger.

While these men don’t seem to share an artistic vision, they do share a similar dream when it comes to how they are transforming their lives. Martin and Schiano both recently purchased buildings in downtown Bangor, and both artists will open their new studios as part of the third annual Downtown Studio Tour on Saturday.

Martin and Schiano took very different journeys as artists, yet came to the same conclusion about how and where they wanted to live and work – downtown Bangor, Maine. Martin’s Lumiere Photographic Studio and home are located at 58 Main St., where Evenings Out bridal shop was located until it closed this spring. Schiano’s unfinished studio and future home is a block away at 40 Columbia St., in a building that has been empty at least 35 years, according to it new owner.

The artists who are now neighbors took diverse paths to the Queen City. Martin moved here from Highland Park, N.J., where he and his wife, Shannon, had been on the faculty at Rutgers University. She accepted a position this summer teaching in the journalism department at the University of Maine. Schiano, who also is an architect and printmaker, has lived and worked in Eastport since 1986. He moved here with his architect wife, Paula Beall.

“We’re from New Jersey, the state with the densest population in the country,” said Martin in explaining why the couple chose downtown Bangor. “We’re not put off by the density of downtown Bangor. It’s a happening place.”

Martin added that he was excited about living above his workplace, since the first-floor studio includes a darkroom. Renovations on the second- and third-floor living quarters have not been completed, he said, but should be finished by the first of the year.

That’s about the time Schiano said his building should be completed, too. It will include the first-floor studio, second-floor architectural office and living quarters on the third and fourth floors. He said that Eastport “is just too remote” and he wanted to be nearer artists in the midcoast and Blue Hill areas. Schiano added that the Bangor studio space will be much more conducive to working on his large pastels.

“I was very cramped in the Eastport studio with no exhibit surfaces,” he said as workers repaired radiators and installed wiring. “I have the same square footage here that I had there, but volumetrically, this space is much larger. I’ll be able to do more than one thing at a time. If I want to do printmaking, I won’t have to pack up all my pastels and vice versa.”

Both men, who as of Tuesday had not met each other, said they were looking forward to Saturday’s event, meeting other artists as well as supporters of the arts in Bangor. Schiano, however, warned that his studio would not be completed by then and most likely his paintings would be leaning against rather than hanging on his studio walls.

In conjunction with the daylong studio tour, a reception will be held at 10:30 a.m. at the Bangor Public Library for the opening of the Historic Downtown Bangor Photo Contest Exhibit. Winners will be announced by Bangor Mayor John Rohman at the reception. The exhibit will be on display through November.

Fifteen studios in downtown Bangor will be included in the tour and artists will be on hand to discuss and sell their work. Artists with studios in the Exchange Building include: Sally Lesko Bates; Fran Clukey; Deborah Rustin Cyr; Ed Healy; Nina Jerome; and Kristbjorg T. Whitney. Artists with studios on Central Street are: Sarah Faragher; Peggy Hanson; Maryann Ingalls and Vera Trobisch; Jeanette Larkin; Tom Staley; and Lindsay Weirich. Wally Warren’s studio at 23A Hammond St. also will be open. The studio tour, sponsored by the Bangor Center Corp., will be held from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. Tickets, which include a tour map and descriptions of the artists’ work, are on sale at the Bangor Convention and Visitors Bureau, Bangor Frameworks, BookMarc’s bookstore, the Grasshopper Shop and Lippincott Books. For more information, call Sally Bates, 945-4400.