American artists who painted in the 19th century would have benefited greatly from contemporary travel reimbursement programs such as frequent flier miles. Of course, they would have been traveling on transcontinental trains and trans-Atlantic steamships – and, personally, I like to think of them on camels, too. The point is: These guys got around, and a trip to Europe was nothing more than a baseline. They also toted their portable atelier equipment to Africa, the Middle East, the Arctic and the South Pacific. It’s a wonder any of them had time to paint.

But paint they did. We might think of them today as the country’s original travel correspondents – except with license to embellish, extract, erase, expand and editorialize with brush strokes.

Harrison Bird Brown of Portland was among their ranks. A prolific artist in the Hudson River School tradition, Brown spent most of his life in his hometown but made requisite trips to Europe, eventually settling permanently in London. Despite his globe-trotting, the subject for which Brown is best known is Maine. His eye for the scenery into which he was born informs the dramatic works in “Vividly True to Nature: Harrison Bird Brown (1831-1915),” running through Sept. 9 at the Portland Museum of Art.

Early on, Brown produced “homestead pictures,” architecturally romantic portraits of the residences of wealthy businessmen. Rays of celestial light and dapples of autumn sun illuminate these paintings as if they depict holy tabernacles. Later, Brown turned his attention to the coast, and there he put a heavenly touch where it was truly deserved.

Luminescent and threatening, Brown’s scenes of the Northeast are merciless and nearly gothic. Storms of water crash upon golden cliffs lit by thrumming halos of light. The turbulence of these wild waters is the most engaging theme of the Portland show, particularly in works such as “Nova Scotia Headlands” and an untitled painting of White Head on Cushing Island.

Yet Brown is more Bierstadt than Bellows, especially in the bucolic landscapes with campsites and picnic parties. Nature always overwhelms human figures in Brown’s vision, but for the expanding view of American nationalism that was taking place in his day, the scale seems right. Brown’s European works of crumbling columns and distant cities are far less compelling, awash with a beatific glow that seems to switch the time frame to the classical era. New England is where Brown’s voice speaks the most declaratively.

In photos of the painter, Brown wears thick suits, has swept-back, kinky hair and an overwhelming beard – much in the same way one imagines his contemporaries Walt Whitman and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, whom Brown

surely would have known as a fellow Portlander. Brown came up the hardscrabble way but apparently was well-known in Maine and elsewhere during his lifetime. He was also part of the society group that eventually evolved into the Portland Museum of Art. Sometime in the early 20th century, his work all but disappeared.

In the 1960s, Brown’s work came back into the ether of the art world, showing up intermittently until this show. I had never heard of him before now, but it’s unlikely he will fall quite so far back into the closets of Maine art history now.

A much smaller show running through June 23 at the Island Institute in Rockland, “Reflecting the Past: Paintings of 19th Century Working Waterfronts,” features the work of children’s book illustrator Loretta Krupinski. Like Brown, Krupinski depicts 19th century Maine, but has based this collection on historic photos or maritime paintings of the era. And her subjects – fishermen, harbor life, industrial buildings and, generally, the working class – couldn’t be more different from Brown’s bounding scenics. Her works are far more contained and earthy.

“I have made no attempt to gild the lily,” writes Krupinski in her artist statement. True, her fishermen show unfettered determination, but there is a quiet, child-story quality to her characters and their settings. You can easily imagine an accompanying narrative: “Fisherman Fred spent every day splitting cod on Monhegan Island. He hauled his tables to the edge of the water and began chopping: kersplit, kersplat, kersplut.” Krupinski’s work is quite charming in this way.

Because the gallery space belongs to Island Institute, the small show actually offers a minihistory lesson about the state’s working waterfronts, including the lime kilns of Rockland and the schooners that transported goods before the trucking industry took over. In the background are the seasons, mountains and waterways that gave the state its early identity as a working place for all things marine.

This is a good show for children because of the artwork, but also because the Krupinski show shares gallery space with Dana McLean, a professional building restorer who has turned his big skills on little projects, such as shrunken lobster boats. Modeled on life-size boats, the small fleet is not only entertaining, it is also a testament to McLean’s own family background of boat designers and builders.

In an odd way, the Brown and Krupinski shows talk to one another. Same time frame, nearly the same location but very different takes. And each one adds to an understanding of life in the state.

For information about the Portland Museum of Art, call 775-6148, or visit www.portlandmuseum.org. For information about the Island Institute, 348 Main St., Rockland, call 594-9209, or visit www.islandinstitute.org.