Prominent on artist Carolyn Gabbe’s website is a quotation from Albert Einstein. “There are two ways you can live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other as though everything is a miracle.” By studying her paintings and by talking with her, I know this brilliant Maine artist sees miracles everywhere.
Her powerful portraits draw in the viewer, connecting the subject, the viewer, and the artist in a charmed triangle. Through all her work, one feels the familiar humanity of each subject, and also their mystery. She captures each person she paints with uncanny realism and at the same time lets them be private and fully known only to themselves, neither smiling nor dour.
I was honored to speak with Carolyn this fall and to learn more about her ongoing career as a successful painter and teacher of painting, with many, many shows and commissions to her name. I was grateful, too, that she let me ask questions about her life as an artist, for this is an area that is important to understand. She was most generous in sharing her experiences and insights. As she has written, there are “little glimpses of souls and beauty that surround us, if we are paying attention.”
Mary:
Where did you grow up? And how did you find your way to Maine?
Carolyn:
Well, I’m an Air Force brat. I’ve been all over. I discovered Maine in, maybe, 1979. My great aunt and uncle built a home here, and I would come and visit. Then my husband and I started vacationing up here in the ’90s. We bought in 2000 and then retired up here full time.
Mary:
Tell me about your artwork and how you got started. Were you a painter in your life before you retired or after?
Carolyn:
It is, I think, my final career, I hope. I started painting when my daughter, Emily, left for college. I’d always wanted to study painting and art, but I was focused on job and career. I had done an undergraduate degree and gotten a job. I got married, and I went to graduate school and worked in the business and nonprofit sector. But always, really, the creative life was what always called me.
Mary:
And did your painting start when you were in Maine?
Carolyn:
Actually, it did. Alyssa is my husband’s daughter. I took a picture of Alyssa’s son, who is a toddler, with my new digital camera, and I was trying to upload it to my computer. I erased it. And I was so frustrated. I said, “I’m just going to have to learn to paint, and paint it.”
Alyssa’s husband, who knows how to paint, said, “Okay, come on!” He took me to the local arts supply store in Damariscotta called Salt Bay Art Supply and bought me some paint, some brushes, and little canvases. He said, “Okay, this is the general idea. Have fun.” And I absolutely loved it.
Mary:
Amazing.
Carolyn:
So, I started. I took some classes at the community college. I took an adult ed class. Then a good friend of mine convinced me to go look at the Studio Incamminati. It took me a couple of years to get up the courage to apply. But I eventually did. And did the four-year full-time program there, the Advanced Fine Art program.
Mary:
Did you really? And this is in your retirement, you did this?
Carolyn:
Yes. Well, I had retired early. I have lupus—I had a forced early retirement for medical reasons. Fortunately, new medication came out, and that’s all set.
Mary:
Do you mind me asking how old you were when you went to college and when you did retire and took on a new career?
Carolyn:
Well, I went to college and I got my bachelor’s and master’s in the normal order of things in my late teens and twenties. I started at art school at 50.
Mary:
Wow.
Carolyn:
And I just turned 60.
Mary:
Now, do you work full time at the art?
Carolyn:
Almost. My first creative outlet is painting—and I do teach drawing and painting. And my other creative outlet is my garden. I have a rather extensive garden, here in Nobleboro. On the lake side of the house, we re-wilded. So it’s all natives, and then I have perennials and then I do have a big vegetable garden as well.
Mary:
Do you think creativity and painting are inherited, a natural talent, or is it something that can be learned?
Carolyn:
I think it’s a combination. There’s inclination and interest and a certain amount of biology in terms of your eyes, the acuity of your eyes for things and hand coordination. But I think also tremendous amount of learning and practice are involved.
Mary:
Do you display your artwork, do artwork by commission, or how do you proceed?
Carolyn:
I’ve been in juried shows, I do group shows, and I teach. I have done commissions. I have a show coming up that opens Labor Day weekend at the Maine Art Gallery in Wiscasset. And I’ll be in another show in Cushing, through the Knox County Art Society at Art in the Barn, in Cushing.
My desire is to keep painting and keep improving because it’s a constant process of learning and practice. I look forward to bringing my painting to a broader audience in Maine and beyond.
Mary:
Can you please describe your method, inspiration, and favorite subjects, when you paint? How do you go about it?
Carolyn:
I am a direct painter and a colorist. I paint directly what I’m painting. I don’t do a drawing underneath. And my favorite thing to paint is people.
Mary:
You seem to be able to capture them exactly! You really bring the intensity of a person to a paintbrush.
Carolyn:
Thank you. That’s my goal. One of my goals.
It’s pretty fun. It’s sort of like getting acquainted with new people. I’ve painted my granddaughter. I’ve painted fellow artists and models, and I just am finishing painting a gentleman in Waldoboro. He’s is about 95 years old. We got acquainted because there was a picture of him in the paper, and it said that he was a World War II veteran, and he was in the same unit as my great uncle.
So, I called him up to see if he knew my great uncle, a long shot. I learned this Waldoboro gentleman was in the relief group at the end of the fighting in the Philippines. He didn’t know my great uncle. Their ships passed in the night.
But it was neat. And he was such an interesting fellow. I said, “Can I come meet you and paint you?” And he said, “Sure.” So, I stood in his living room on a tarp and did an alla prima painting [a technique where wet paint is applied to previous layers of still-wet paint, to capture moments in a spontaneous style]. Then I went home and finished it. That was really fun. I meet interesting people.
Mary:
Do you work from a picture, or do you have your subjects sit for you?
Carolyn:
I work predominantly from life. They sit, but you know, that’s not always feasible for someone to spend the entire amount of time. So, I will also work from reference photos that I take, but it’s not the same. Working straight from a photo, you just don’t get the same result.
The camera filters information and makes adjustments to color and value. And the camera gets that nanosecond in time. You don’t get a sense of how the person’s expressions move across their face or their postures. You can end up getting something that doesn’t capture the person. When you see a picture of somebody—think of people on dating sites—vs. vs them in real life, it’s different because in real life they’re animated.
Mary:
Do you sometimes meet people and say, “I have to paint this person”? Like seeing them is an inspiration to you?
Carolyn:
Yes. Yes, that was exactly it. And a lot of people say no.
There is one woman that I’ve been wanting to paint since before I went to art school, and I still haven’t gotten her to sit down for me.
Mary:
What is it about her that really makes you want to paint her?
Carolyn:
She’s just interesting. She’s fascinating and has wonderful energy and just a really beautiful spirit. It intrigues me.
Mary:
Is there anybody that ever commissioned you to do a painting that you just couldn’t do? Or does that not happen to you?
Carolyn:
Not for a commission, but we all have on days and off days. There are some people, you can capture a likeness without capturing the spirit.
And some people are more interesting, and some days you’re more on. There’s sort of an alchemy. I guess as artists we’re always trying to control things as much as possible, so that every day can be our best day.
Mary:
What is your favorite portrait that you have painted—the one that you were most pleased with?
Carolyn:
Oh, boy. How to pick a favorite? Probably some of the ones that I’ve done of my granddaughter, because I caught aspects of her personality. We’re all multifaceted. It’s hard to say everything you have to say about someone in one image.
Mary:
In most of your paintings, do your subjects have smiles or are they dour in appearance? Do you have a certain style of your portraits in this regard?
Carolyn:
No, the pose is really about the person, but now that I think about it, they do not have big smiles, but they’re not dour. They might be thoughtful. They might be engaged in an activity.
Mary:
Who is an artist who has been influential to you?
Carolyn:
I admire many, but I have to say the one I marvel at the most is Nelson Shanks (1937–2015). He founded Studio Incamminati where I went to school, and then his proteges he trained for the instructors. He was just masterful at painting technique, but also at capturing personality and emotion. Just brilliant. He painted Princess Diana, the Pope, Reagan, Clinton, the women of the Supreme Court, and Pavarotti. He’s amazing.
Mary:
Is it expensive for someone to hire you, to commission a job?
Carolyn:
I don’t think so. I’d like to be expensive. That’s one of my goals, to be expensive, but I’m not there yet.
Mary:
How long does it take you if someone says, okay, will you paint this portrait for me? How long does it take you to do that?
Carolyn:
That really varies. You know, if they want just an alla prima study it might be three to six hours. If they want a full figure portrait with lots of background, that could take months. It just depends on how detailed and involved a portrait they want.
Mary:
Have you ever done a self-portrait?
Carolyn:
I have not. I have avoided that. And it’s an important thing that I need to tackle.
Mary:
How do you see the future? Do you think this will be a lifelong journey to keep painting?
Carolyn:
I think it’s a lifelong journey, and I pray that I will be able to paint to the end of my time. I just enjoy it so much.
For more information, please visit Carolyn Gabbe’s website, https://www.carolyngabbeartist.com/
and go to the Contemporary Realism Show at Maine Art Gallery Wiscasset, August 28 to September 18, curated by Elaine Pew.
