Down to Earth Philadelphia sculptor brings nature-based exhibit to Northeast Harbor

In a way, Steve Tobin is coming home this month when he brings some of his acclaimed “Naked Earth” sculptures to Northeast Harbor for a unique exhibit at the edge of the Atlantic.

No, the Philadelphia-area artist was not born in Maine and he doesn’t even live here part-time like so many of the people who will see, touch and marvel at his work on view June 18 through Labor Day.

But for Tobin, Maine is the logical place to exhibit the art he creates from gloriously mundane elements of nature, including termite hills, buffalo bones, sea urchins and the forest floor. The pieces range in weight from 500 pounds to 4 tons.

“I think art started as something that man did as a natural occurrence and it became more separated from nature and now it’s moving back toward nature,” Tobin said recently from his 14-acre farm outside Philadelphia.

“I like to take sculpture a step further [than do traditional sculptors] and work more directly with nature, and what better place than Maine?” continued the artist, who has been hailed by some art critics as one of the most important sculptors of the last 100 years.

Tobin’s “Naked Earth” show has been featured at major metropolitan museums across the country, including the American Museum of Natural History in New York City and the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History, as well as museums in Finland, Japan and Switzerland.

His bronze “Bone Wall,” created with 1,000 buffalo and other animal bones, his glittering glass waterfalls and his bronze African termite hills – some as tall as 30 feet – will be the focus of an eight-page spread in Smithsonian magazine this summer. Next year, “Naked Earth” travels to Stonehenge in England.

“I like to show in nature settings,” reflected the sculptor, a math and science major in college, who likes to blur the lines of science and art with his own creations from nature.

“I like taking the work out to the people so they can see it not as art, but as nature in a sense,” he said. “By showing at an informal place like in the harbor, people are going to see it from the water and the land and many will not know what it is.

“I love the fact that the lobsterman will come up to it and kick it to see what it is,” he said.

Tobin’s decision to bring “Naked Earth” to the Mount Desert village of Northeast Harbor was inspired both by Philadelphia friends who summer there and by his own visits to Maine and Mount Desert Island over the years.

“There is a lot of theater and dance [in Maine], but rarely is there public art up there,” he said. “This is an opportunity to bring art into a community that doesn’t have public art. That’s exciting to me.”

Tobin will install his Northeast Harbor exhibit June 18 at the same time the Portland Museum of Art unveils his permanent donation to the museum – one of his glittering glass lantern houses.

“Art has a mixed reputation. A lot of people are intimidated by art. They think it’s a lot of pretentious hoopla. My work is meant to be touched or kicked. None of my pieces are on pedestals or bases. I love that. This is a chance to bridge the gap between artists and people who are disenfranchised” by art.

Alden Wilson, director of the Maine Arts Commission, says Tobin has earned “a significant national reputation” for his sculptures and, like the artist, he hopes the work will inspire people to talk about and debate art.

Wilson says art does sometimes spark controversy in Maine, but seldom does it rise to a statewide issue. Rather, in the Maine tradition of independence and local control, it typically is a neighborhood or community issue.

“I think Maine is a very accommodating place” for art, Wilson said. “Maine has always been accustomed to a very rich and artistic life and I think it’s very much a fiber of our lives here.”

Residents and visitors to Northeast Harbor this summer can thank Mount Desert selectmen for allowing the exhibit on the village green, a rare move in itself considering how hard the town strives to limit commercialization of its popular marina and waterfront.

Selectmen were initially reluctant to make an exception to their rules, even for a sculptor whose work reflects the mystery and natural beauty of the Earth. But in the end, they were persuaded by Tobin’s art consultant, Kathleen Rogers of Ellsworth, and Selectman Emily Damon Pascal, who advocated strongly for the “Naked Earth” show.

“[Art] is inspiring and lovely and I think we should embrace it,” Pascal told fellow selectmen with a gentle rebuke. “I don’t think this is about commercialization. It’s about education and I wholeheartedly support it.”

Tobin hopes “Naked Earth” will both inspire and mystify people, but he also knows it might be panned. That’s the nature of art, after all, and he will relish the public discussion and debate.

“I invite the dialogue,” he said. “Some people will say, ‘Why is this art?’ I look forward to it being debated in the press: ‘I love it,’ ‘I hate it,’ ‘What is it?'”

“Naked Earth” is on view June 18 through Labor Day at the Village Green in Northeast Harbor. On Mount Desert Island, take Route 198 to Northeast Harbor. Before the village, turn left for the Northeast Harbor marina and waterfront, where the sculptures are installed. The exhibit is free.